


Opposing Objectives

by Up_a_Creek



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Father-Son Relationship, Fluff, Friendship, Friendship/Love, Gen, M/M, Tags Are Hard
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-17
Updated: 2018-08-04
Packaged: 2019-05-24 12:54:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 26,542
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14955072
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Up_a_Creek/pseuds/Up_a_Creek
Summary: Five days after the successful android demonstration and human evacuation of Detroit, Connor and Hank meet once again. Each have their own ideas about how the other should be living their life. Will this drive them apart or will they manage to stick together in this new world?This takes place postgame, so it will be in spoiler territory.





	1. Reunion

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies for any wonky formatting or ill use of tags. I've mostly just lurked on this site and am quite new to posting. I'm also social media illiterate, so these tags really threw me for a loop.  
> Warning - personal and sappy note at the end. I promise not to leave such long notes on future chapters.

Opposing Objectives

Chapter One: Reunion

              Had Connor ever been embraced before? He’d first been activated more than three months ago, and in his fifteen weeks, two days, and thirteen hours, he had not acquired any memories of receiving or giving a hug. He had witnessed the act between others multiple times. Being pulled into someone else was an entirely different situation.

              Face pressed into the man’s neck, Connor inhaled deeply. A mixture of stale smoke and cedar bodywash filled his senses. For the first time since he’d fallen into deviancy, he didn’t feel the need to keep a constant scan of his surroundings. He let himself simply experience.

              And then Hank pulled away, though he kept a hand on Connor’s shoulder. “You look like shit, you know that?”

Connor blinked, unsure of how to respond. The lieutenant was wrong. He had made sure to secure and change into a fresh suit, new from the packaging, before leaving to meet outside the abandoned Chicken Feed. A quick neatening of his hair in front of a mirror had also been managed. Connor presented himself perfectly. Wounds healed, stains of human blood scrubbed clean, and any thirium spilled surely aged into invisibility towards the human eye.

Connor did not have to answer Hank’s faulty observation. With a little squeeze followed by a pat, Hank let go and crossed his arms. “So to what do I owe the pleasure of this little visitation?”

“Androids have been sent to obtain a census of all the humans left in Detroit. A CX100 model recorded your name.” Connor paused before asking the question that made him reach out to his once partner. “What are you still doing in the city, Hank? The evacuation was five days ago.”

Hank shrugged. “I have nowhere else to be.”

“It’s too dangerous for you to be here. Many of the deviants—androids are angry. Some may displace that emotion. Not to mention the violence of humans from both inside and outside. The drone strikes, the raids that have broken through the barriers. You could be caught in any number of crosshairs.”

“Look kid, you’re not going to scare me off from my own home. I’m a goddamn cop; I can take care of myself.”

That didn’t matter. Any previous skillset could be erased by one stray bullet. Connor had run thirty-two hundred scenarios in which Hank could be injured or killed by staying. Possible outcomes consistently wrote themselves in his background functions since he spotted Hank on the list.

“That is absurd. The chances of any of this having a peaceful resolution are negligible.”

“I survived your guy’s first round of revolution. I’m pretty sure I can handle whatever comes next.”

“If the politics don’t go our way, the army may not target only androids.”

Hank rubbed at the back of his neck, head turned down toward the cement. “I can’t leave,” he stopped for a moment to seemingly pick his words. “I just can’t leave. There’s nothing for me out there. So don’t tell me I need to go. I don’t want to hear it.”

“But Lieutenant,”

“I said don’t!”

              The pair stared off under the emerging sun on that grey morning. Connor’s chest unconsciously mimicked Hank’s heavy breaths. It made no sense why he would want to stay. Hank certainly hadn’t been happy here before the uprising, so why would he elect to live in what could very well be an active warzone?

              The police lieutenant turned on his heel, taking two steps towards his car before looking back over his shoulder. “If you’re not too busy fighting for freedom or whatever, I have a couple errands you could help me with.”

A myriad of tasks he could be accomplishing flashed before his eyes, but Connor filed them all. He followed towards the car, pausing when his hand rested on the passenger door handle. It felt familiar. Not many things did in this new world.

              Connor closed his eyes, letting the sun on his face compete with the chill in the breeze. An update on his current status formed, then passed along to the closest android he trusted would get the message to those who could reach Markus. He would return to the fold when his mission was complete.

              New objective: Convince Hank to leave Detroit.

 

 

* * *

 

 

              Surprisingly enough, not much vandalism had been committed to the police station. Perhaps the reinforced windows spanning the front of the building had deterred punks looking to rough things up before hightailing. Or maybe they were more afraid of what could possibly be inside.

              Nobody sat at the front desk to greet the pair as they walked through the main doors. Hank looked back to catch Connor casing the entrance. His gaze fell onto what had once been automated gates. Now metal stumps with exposed wires and shards of glass took their place. Hank wasn’t really sure who had smashed the gate. Judging by the too precise script “Please come in” spray-painted on the floor, his guess was one of the android cops. Or maybe the once receptionist who now donned a stolen badge.

              Glass crunched underfoot as they passed through into the cubicle farm. “You’re still going to work?” Connor asked.

Hank first stumbled back into the station half a day after the android demonstration succeeded. He sat down at his desk like it was any other day. Nobody told him to leave. Considering that he was technically on suspension after punching that prick Perkins, it was pretty fortunate. “What else am I supposed to do?”

              Upon reaching his desk, Hank plopped down into his chair, bumping back into cube wall. It was here in this spot that he first caught sight of Connor since the dogs had been called off the hunt.

Media was banned from accessing the city by ground or air, but that hadn’t stopped the most determined of productions from sending in drones. Every now and then, they managed to catch some footage of the android revolutionary known as Markus before being taken out by the armed forces’ own drones. Hank had been watching the news on his computer, marveling at the idea of still having power let alone internet access, when he first saw shaky footage of the rebel leader. And there had been Connor, right at Markus’ side.

Connor picked something up off the empty desk next to his. Hank didn’t need to stare to know he held a plastic name plaque. Some dolt had ordered it as a joke. Swapped it out with Hank’s one day. Got a lot of laughs on that. Real funny.

Hank had originally tossed it in a drawer and forgotten about it. That is until one lonely post-revolution night when he, for some reason, thought it would look just swell on the desk Connor used once. Now the android was here and tracing his finger along the engraved letters of ‘Connor.’

Connor sat the name plaque back down. “Have there been many other officers who’ve stayed like you?”

“A few,” Hank answered. He tapped the arms of his chair without a clear rhythm. “Most who have families to think of left, but I’ve seen a couple of old fucks like me passing through. I’ve mostly been in the company of our android force though.” He gestured towards the half dozen androids in police uniforms shuffling about. Probably three times the amount of them out on the streets.

“What have you been doing?”

“Busy work, mostly.”

Connor stared at him, probably knowing it was a lie. Cleaning up the city had been some of the most real work he’d done in years. He offered whatever support he could give to whoever walked in past the painted welcome sign.

              “Lieutenant Anderson,” a standard police model said as she approached them. She had a slight smile on her face, the same one she’d always worn before she was freed. It used to creep him out, but not so much anymore. “Would you like for me to accompany you in searching today? Thirteen new names have been added to the missing persons list since you were last here.”

“Tomorrow. Miller and Marsh took over for today.”

“Understood. Is there anything I can do for you?”

He shrugged. She remained, waiting for a real answer. Her eyes glanced over towards Connor a few furtive times, but her determined look mostly settled on Hank.

“Me personally, no. I’m taking the day off.”

Had she still been equipped with an LED, it would have flashed briefly as she processed. Instead, all Hank had to go on was her eaglelike stare. “Yes, that would be good for your health.”

She turned to walk away and Hank called after her, “Don’t scan me, Denise!”

“I am going to take care of some items on the board. I will await your return bright and early tomorrow,” she said without looking back. Hank watched her head towards another android and wordlessly communicate for a moment.

“Lieutenant, if you didn’t bring me here for work, then what are we doing here?”

“We,” he began as he grabbed a key from his desk drawer. “Are going to get you some proper gear.”

 

              The supply room had always struck Hank as sort of funny. If you looked past the riot gear and weaponry, he imagined it could have belonged in any mundane office. Bad light, strict organization not being followed, and just enough room to store anything except people looking for supplies.

              Connor waited wordlessly out in the hall. Hank rifled through a shelving unit filled with Kevlar gear. Things had gotten more hectic than usual in there, what with the uprising and all, and what should have been a quick search was taking longer than expected. He wasn’t surprised when Connor found that he couldn’t stay quiet any longer. “Did that android have a problem with me?”

“Who? Denise?”

“Yes, as far as I surmised.”

“Then, yep.”

“Why?”

Hank chuckled. He lifted up a vest, then discarded it for being too small of a size. “You’re her competition.”

“What?”

“That one’s a real go-getter. Came back here during the evacuation and hasn’t left as far as I know. Not sure if it’s because she thinks my rank still holds meaning or if it’s because I was previously paired with an android, but she’s taken to thinking of me as her partner. Probably afraid you’re coming back to replace her.”

Connor made a noise that was somewhere between a laugh and a choke.

“You could come back. Not like rules mean anything around here anymore.” Hank peered over to gauge his reaction to the statement and received a polite smile in return. “Really, it’s been great so far. I can have a whole bottle instead of just a flask. And I even brought Sumo in one day.” Still no reply. “Pretty great stuff happening around here.”

“Have you found what you’re looking for yet?”

 

              Hank’s gut twisted when he saw Connor putting on the slim bulletproof vest over his suit jacket. He helped him adjust the fit and gave him a hearty pat on the chest when they were done. “You have a habit of attracting bullets,” he said. He tried to keep his tone light. “Maybe this will keep you going.”

Connor lifted his arms and craned his neck to get a better look at his new attire. Looked like Cole did trying on a little suit for the first time. A family friend had asked him to be their ringbearer, and he just couldn’t get over his excitement for the responsibility. God, that was what, seven years ago already? He’d been so enamored at the idea of looking like a grownup…

“Lieutenant?”

“Hmm?” Hank snapped back to the present. “What?”

“Are you sure it’s alright for me to take this?”

“Nobody else is using it.”

Connor adjusted the vest some more. “Thank you.”

              There’d been a handful more times that Hank had managed to catch sight of Connor on the news over the past few days. Each time Connor showed evidence of what his new life was really like. Not this new suit and washed face bullshit. Bullet holes in his clothes, blue smeared around fresh wounds, gun drawn. Eyes wildly hunting for any sign of threat to Markus. It made Hank sick.

              Connor wasn’t like the others. This wasn’t some virus that he caught one day. He didn’t have an emotional shock that suddenly woke him. No, Hank had seen him grow. Witnessed him become a person. A good person. The kid saved lives! And Hank sure as fuck was not going to let him be made into a weapon for some goddamn robot messiah.

              It didn’t matter the cost. Hank was going to save Connor.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for taking the time to read this! It means a lot to me that anyone would read my work.  
> Writing was my only creative outlet as a kid. More recently, I let fear and life (mostly fear) get the best of me, and this is my first time actually sitting down and writing something in more than six years. I know this story will have plenty of flaws, but working on it has been a freeing experience. I feel like I've gotten something back.  
> I've become quite rusty and wasted valuable years where I could be improving, so I welcome any constructive feedback. I've missed writing, especially fanfiction as it has some of the best communities on the internet. 
> 
> Also, thank you to those who have written fics that have given me great joy and inspired me to finally push myself to try again. Maybe one day I will get the courage to actually tell you that you've helped someone.
> 
> Okay, mush-fest over. :)


	2. Errand

              Despite all dozen or so parking spaces being empty, Hank pulled his sedan into the spot furthest from the door. A lightboard sign on a post flickered above them. It once said Hilltop Foods, but was rendered illegible due to the jagged hole left from a thrown brick. The broken plastic now looked like a fanged smile.

Both the door and windows of the corner store were boarded with neatly stacked planks. Debris of all kinds—trash, bits of plastic and glass, and the odd scrap of clothing—scattered the asphalt. The scene reminded Hank of the news whenever a hurricane struck a coastal town.

“Are we here to loot?” Connor asked with a curious innocence better suited to a six-year-old.

Hank rolled his eyes and got out of the car, careful not to slam the door too hard. Poor thing was finally starting to show her age. He’d never be able to find another manual in his price range. His android companion climbed out of the other side. “For God’s sake Connor, take that vest off. We’re not looting.”

              Connor followed closely behind as they crossed the lot toward the convenience store. Pellets of snow collected in his hair and on his shoulders. Didn’t show any signs of the cold getting to him though. Hank tugged his own jacket a little tighter against a sharp gust of air. It was going to be a hell of a winter.

At his temple, Connor’s LED spun in a shade of blue. “While I understand your biological need to procure food, I’d first like to confirm that this establishment has truly been abandoned.”

Hank ignored him.

“The current lease was signed by one Janet Mendoza in October 2036. Thirteen recorded incidents of vandalism, twenty theft, and two armed burglaries. Her name isn’t on our census, but even if she were here, it sounds like she would be used to having her store robbed. This isn’t a very good neighborhood, Lieutenant.”

Posters advertising cigarettes and lotto’s wrinkled between the door’s glass and the two-by-fours reinforcing it. Hank shook his head and pulled it open, revealing the brightly lit shop.

              “Good afternoon, Mr. Anderson,” a women’s voice said with a mechanical undertone. “You’re here early today.” The android stationed behind the only register at the front of the store gave a smile displaying perfect teeth. A baseball cap with the logo of Hank’s old university was pulled down tight on her head, and a weathered flannel shirt had been tossed over her Cyberlife issued uniform. Her lapel triangle glowed through a tear where a pocket had once been.

Hank spared her a curt nod and an “Afternoon Gina,” before grabbing a shopping basket from the stack and dodging into the first aisle.

A bell chimed as the door closed behind Connor. “You’re the RK800!” Gina’s vocal system crackled with an electric pop. “I saw you on the news, marching with all those people. You’re a hero.” Connor politely greeted her, stopping to answer a few questions she had about where he had found so many androids and whether or not he was just so scared that night. Hank chuckled to himself while faking interest in jars of olives. Felt like a lifetime ago, but he’d been in his shoes once. Not to that extreme or anything, but people recognized his picture from the papers a couple of times back in the day.

“I can carry that,” Connor said when he managed to rejoin him. He reached for the basket.

Hank withdrew it. “Really?”

“You’ll be able to shop more efficiently with the full use of both arms.”

“I’m fine.”

Connor grabbed at the handle again anyway. “You said I could help you with your errands. Let me help you.” He gave a tug and Hank finally let go after mediocre resistance.

“Fine, knock yourself out.”

“Thank you.”

              Hank didn’t pick anything out until they reached the packaged soup section. He tossed a couple packs of chili lime ramen into the basket and Connor narrowed his eyes at it. They continued on through the limited offerings provided by the few shelves. Out of the corner of his eye, Hank caught Connor slipping a bag of chips from the basket and back onto the shelf.

              Hank passed by the minimalistic display of produce without a second glance. Really just a card table with some lunchbox apples, browned bananas, and bags of shredded lettuce. Connor stopped at it, and Hank heard some items crumple the plastic bags of his assorted junk food. “You should really shop somewhere with a better selection,” Connor commented as they made their way to the backwall lined with built-in coolers.

“This place is close to my house.”

“It’s 5.7 miles away from your house. There is a co-op two miles closer and grocery store within a mile.”

“Are they open?”

“Fair point.”

              Underneath an animated sign for milk, bottles of blue blood stood shoulder to shoulder. There was a soft luminescent glow to them. It took Hank a second to figure out what exactly it was they were looking at. “Well that’s new,” he said.

Connor scrunched his brows. “That doesn’t need to be refrigerated.”

“Isn’t it neat?” Gina asked from her post. “Some guy brought a whole box of it yesterday. I’d never seen it bottled up like that before.”

“Thirium wasn’t available for retail in the past,” Connor said.

“Oh. Well, I think it looks nice there. Plus all the milk keeps going bad and I have nothing to replace it with.”

“As long as it doesn’t freeze, its integrity should remain intact.”

Hank figured this was a lot like when his ex would yammer to other women in certain aisles while shopping – he didn’t belong in the conversation. So, he continued onto his last item.

              Hank could tell Connor was trying his hardest not to judge while he grabbed for a twelve pack of cheap domestic beer. The android stood still behind him, averting his eyes. Hank gave a pointed look at his altered shopping basket. “I think I’ll carry this myself.” Bottles clinked as he headed for the front.

              “We received a load today,” Gina said when they approached the register. “It was nowhere near what I ordered, but it’s still a good sign, isn’t it?”

Hank shrugged and put his beer on the counter. Connor followed suit with the items in the basket. Gina watched, standing perfectly still. No fidgeting. No breathing. No blinking. Hank shifted from one foot to the other and concentrated on getting his wallet from his back pocket.

“Oh no, Mr. Anderson. You know better than to try to pay.”

“Gotta start charging me sometime. You can’t run a business by giving everything out for free.”

“Other people pay. Just not you.” She happily explained. Her voice cracked, and the second part of her statement came out sounding purely machinelike. “Paper or plastic today?”

“Paper’s fine.” Hank prayed that Connor wouldn’t question her words.

He should have known better. “Why don’t you charge him?”

“Mr. Anderson saved my life.” Gina began to stack items into a bag she retrieved from below the counter. A logo for a chain grocery store was printed on the side. “He saved a lot of lives.”

Connor searched Hank’s face for the story.

“Don’t overblow it.”

 

              He really hadn’t done much. Freshly suspended and aching for an aspirin and a drink, he’d stopped in at the corner store on his way back from the station like he’d done so many other times before. The first clue that some shit had gone down was the bright blue puddle on the glass display of scratch tickets. Second clue was the man’s body sprawled out on the tiled floor. Blue trickled down from the counter and mixed with the trail of red that led to the man’s face. A shoe print smeared through the mess, leaving a maroon trail towards the bathrooms in the back corner. With a heavy sigh, Hank crouched down and squeezed the man’s wrist. Pulse. Steady. Appeared to have taken a blow to the face and most of the blood loss was from his nose.

              As much as he wanted to simply grab his things and go, Hank seemed to be the only conscious person on the sales floor. Didn’t need to add theft to his list of misdeeds for the day. He tracked the prints to the women’s room and pushed the door open without knocking. Gina huddled against an overflowing trashcan, hugging her knees to her chest. An attempt to tend to her wounds had been made, but spinning insides were still visible between the paper towels compacted into the skull fracture. “She sent him, she sent him,” the android muttered to herself on repeat in-between sobs.

              What had made Hank offer his hand out to her? Loneliness? Regret? He’d just gotten rid of the robot that’d been a thorn in his ass over the past few days. Helped him go in fact. But Hank didn’t hesitate to bring the injured woman home with him.

              Turns out androids are a lot like squirrels. If you start buying peanuts for the one with the limp you keep seeing out on your lawn, you’ll end up feeding the whole damn neighborhood of them.

 

              In the few moments Hank lost himself in memory, Connor had reached out towards Gina, the skin of his hand gone to reveal white plastic. “Connor!” Hank barked, and the android retracted his arm. Whatever Gina hadn’t packed away yet got tossed into the paper bag, which Hank then ripped off the counter. He grabbed his beer, then took off towards the door.

“Have a good day, Mr. Anderson,” Gina called, seemingly unphased by his shift in mood.

He looked over his shoulder to say some sort of a goodbye. Connor’s hand was exposed again, this time hovering over the pay terminal. Yellow flashed from the side of his head. Hank pushed the door open with his boot and headed outside, wind and snow whipping at his face.

Although he had a head start, he was rejoined before getting halfway to the car. “I’m sorry Lieutenant, I didn’t mean to pry.” Connor yelled to be heard over the weather.

Hank kept his body turned away so that the android couldn’t reach for his groceries. “Whatever, it’s fine.”

              Hank sounded like his ex-wife. It wasn’t really fine. Nothing was fine. Someone at the station assured him that they’d get the necessary supplies down to the store. Gina was supposed to have taken that blue blood stuff, not stocked it. She should’ve been repaired and humanlike and happy running her own store. Living her own life with newfound freedom.

              Instead, all Connor saw was a broken-down robot singing praises of yet another dangerous stunt he pulled.

              Hank balanced his bag on the trunk of the car so that he could fish keys from his coat pocket. Connor watched in silence. “You still got time, or do you need to run back to Markus now?”

“I have time, Lieutenant.”

 

* * *

 

              Connor swayed with the road. Each turn slid him around in the passenger seat, his jacket slick against the worn leather. Heavy drums and a powerful vocalist strained the radio. Hank mumbled along, matching less than a fourth of the lyrics. His thumbs trilled against the steering wheel to no particular tempo. Connor closed his eyes, getting lost in the gentle hum of the car’s archaic engine.

              He was where he belonged.

              An irrational thought. In his twenty-five hundred or so active hours, what percentage had been spent in that seat? Less than one. The aged Oldsmobile was titled to Lt. Hank Anderson, of whom Connor was no longer partnered. The passenger seat was no more his place than anyone else’s.

              Connor planted his feet firmly against the dirtied carpet to keep himself steady. Outside was grey. Forecast read cloudy with an inch and a half of snow by midnight. He mentally flipped to his GPS. Nearly there.

 

              Wide tire treads gouged through the middle of Hank’s lawn. And a streetlamp was downed at the corner. Apart from this, the ramshackle looked just as Connor remembered. “Are you coming?” Hank called from the front stoop. Connor had offered to retrieve the groceries from the trunk, but had gotten distracted by taking in the sight of the house. He didn’t think he’d ever see it again. It was the only home he’d ever visited that wasn’t an active crime scene.

“Coming,” Connor called back. He adjusted his tie, then lifted the single bag and case of beer from the trunk. Hank held the front door open for him.

              As soon as the pair were inside, Sumo audibly padded across the living room. First he stopped at his owner, pushing his snout into Hank’s soft middle. “Hey there boy,” Hank said, giving the Saint Bernard a single pat before walking towards the kitchen. Sumo turned his attention to Connor.

He offered the dog a smile. “Hello Sumo.” Sumo returned the greeting by sniffing at his pants. His hefty bulk unbalanced Connor and pushed him into a corner.

“Let him in!” Upon hearing his owner’s voice, the dog’s head perked up and he trotted away.

              Connor placed the bag and box on an empty counter while Hank spilled kibble into Sumo’s food bowl. The dog waited to shove his face into the meal until his owner stepped away. “Have a seat,” Hank told Connor, gesturing to the small kitchen table. The only clutter on it was an empty plate with crumbs. Connor did as instructed and sat straight-backed in one of the wooden chairs. Bottles clinked as Hank slid his beer onto the top shelf of the refrigerator. A chilled can of different brand was in his hand when he backed out of the fridge. Hank opened it with a crack and a hiss as he leaned back against a counter. He looked towards Connor. “I’d make you something, but I don’t cook and you don’t eat.”

“I appreciate the offer, Lieutenant.”

              There was a draft in the kitchen. Connor traced it to the window he had smashed through ten days before. It was still broken, poorly patched with plastic and duct tape. “Still owe me for the window.”

Sincere or jest? “I can make the repairs for you. Cyberlife will probably not be refunding you for it after all.”

Hank shrugged one shoulder and took a long slow drink.

              An attempt at tidying up had been made at some point. Residue from a cleaning product dried atop the counters. Most of the assorted clutter on them had been pushed back to make room for large unorganized swipes with a rag.

“So, you’re keeping your, you know,” Hank circled his finger at his temple in a gesture commonly associated with lunacy. “Your LED in, huh?”

“Yes. Should I remove it?”

“No, I just noticed that a lot of your people were taking them out.”

“I’m an android, Lieutenant. There’s no reason for me to pretend to be something I’m not.”

“Oh,” was all Hank said in reply.

              The lieutenant turned away to pack his groceries into nearly empty cabinets. Plastic bags crumpled as he tossed them up. Hank’s nose wrinkled when he picked up an apple. “You should enjoy fresh produce while you can.” Connor said. “While the push for urban farming was a valiant idea, there aren’t enough greenhouses to support the number of humans left through the winter.”

“Well, maybe the good people out there will find it in their hearts to air drop us in some salad or whatever the hell you think I should be eating.”

“Not likely.”

“They’re already bringing us in some stuff. Gina said—”

“She was mistaken. There have been zero attempts of anything coming into Detroit apart from cameras and guns. An android likely returned to work in a local distribution warehouse and sent that order to her.”

“Ah,” Hank popped his tongue against the roof of his mouth. “Good thing I’ve got a can opener then.”

              Hank moved into the living room and settled down into an overstuffed chair. Connor followed and sat on the middle cushion of the couch. Hearing the two leave the room, Sumo left his bowl and joined them. He put his head onto Connor’s thighs, effectively filling his lap. Connor pet the dog slowly. It felt nice. His fur was soft and every touch made Sumo nudge up into his hand the slightest bit.

“Heard you guys were hanging around the Cyberlife tower.”

Connor scratched behind one of Sumo’s ears and received a low groan of approval. “Yes, Markus has decided to make it his base of operations.” Surely there was no harm in divulging that to Hank.

“Base of operations? Sounds like something a comic book villain say.”

“I believe they usually have lairs.”

Hank snorted. “So what goes on down there?”

“Talking mostly. Markus and Mr. Kamski have established a connection to officials outside the city and are trying to keep lines open.”

“Kamski?” Disdain showed clearly on Hank’s face.

“I don’t like him either. But he’s taken great interest in Markus and may prove to be a valuable asset. He’s even managed to regain control of Cyberlife. Or, at least, he presents it that way.”

A brief silence overfell the pair. Slobber from Sumo’s muzzle puddled in Connor’s lap. He was starting to be able to feel large crumbs of kibble through the wet fabric. Connor remembered seeing a ‘dry-clean only’ symbol on the tag of his suit. Visiting Hank could prove to be quite expensive.

“So, if Kamski is with you, does that mean that one girl – what’s her name, the cute one,” Hank motioned outward with his hand until the name came to mind with a snap of his fingers. “Chloe. Is she with you too then?”

For the first time since rejoining the police lieutenant, Connor forced the smile on his face. It felt tight and stilted. “She and several others of her model have been at the tower.”

“You ever talk to her?”

“I tried.”

 

              Seeing the blonde woman had been, to Connor at least, the only highlight of Markus allowing Kamski to join him. While their creator seemingly always kept at least three ST200 models in his presence, one was far better dressed than the others. She stood out as being the one who greeted them at the door when he and Hank arrived for their interview. She was the one who first passed the Turing test. The one for whom Connor failed the Kamski test.

              It was not often that that particular android was ever in a different room than her master. At the first chance he had, Connor followed her into an empty breakroom where she had gone to brew a cup of tea. She didn’t turn around when he entered the room, not even when his shoes squeaking disrupted the silence. He reached out an exposed hand and laid it gently on her arm. “Wake up,” he thought. She continued with her task and he thought harder, wrinkling his brow. He spoke out loud to her through clenched jaw. “You can wake up now.” Chloe turned finally. She stared into him with an even expression, the only he’d ever seen upon her lovely face.

              Chloe’s eyes were the same as when he held a gun to her head.

 

A shiver jolted Connor, disturbing Sumo enough for the dog to elect to walk away and sit at his owner’s feet. No matter what he did, Connor could not erase the memory of those pale blue eyes from his system.

              “C’mon,” Hank said rising to his feet with a grunt. Sumo gave an irritable huff before returning to the kitchen. “Let’s go.”

“Where are we going?”

“You look like a man who could use a drink.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to all those reading so far, and an extra thank you to those who left kudos and comments on the first chapter! :) It felt spectacular when I saw them. If I am ever late to reply to a comment, it's not because I haven't read it, it's because I'm working up the nerves to reply (if that makes any sense).
> 
> My goal is to update this fic weekly at least, and I may run a few chapters further out than I originally planned. I've broken away from my story chart a bit.
> 
> I am excited for chapter three! It's going to include some of the ideas that made me want to write this.


	3. Drinks

              “Alright Connor, now we’re looting.” Hank wound back a step before launching one of his signature over-twenty-years-on-the-force kicks against the wooden door. It gave in after only two hits, swinging open to reveal a darkened bar. The door slammed back shut without latching. Hank clucked his tongue. He expected better, Jim. Never cheap out on the lock.

              Hank had taken Connor to the place where they first met, Jimmy’s Bar. Twofold reasoning really. He hoped that maybe some good old nostalgia would fry the kid’s circuits like how it hit him in the gut. And he also wasn’t keeping anything stronger than beer in his house now. It was only six o’clock, but between the clouds, the snow, and the number of streetlights taken out, it looked like it could be the early hours of the morning. In other words, a good night for whiskey.

“Are you sure you want to be raiding your friend’s business?”

“Eh, not like he’ll know it was me. Besides, first signs of an android uprising and I’m sure he booked a ticket to good old Canada.”

              Two signs stood out against the windowless door. A glaring red one banning androids from entering the establishment, and a warning yellow one signifying no dogs either. Connor stared at the one forsaking his people while he fiddled with his tie. Digging his fingernails underneath it, Hank managed to pull the sign off with some force. Tossed the damn thing back into the snow that was quickly building. Hank gestured towards the one left. “Next time, we’ll bring Sumo and I’ll get rid of that one too.”

Connor smiled. Looked natural. Not like that weird one he pulled sometimes.

              Jimmy’s Bar, though abandoned, looked the same as always. Various football and basketball team pendants glowed from the walls. Tables and booths were pushed off to one side of the room. On the other was a curved bar that looked like it belonged balancing coffees and breakfast in a diner more so than slinging drinks in a dive. Hank wandered back into the small kitchen area and found the master lighting system tucked into the wall. After pushing a few buttons, a soft ballad came through the speakers and the neon wall signs came to life.

              When Hank returned to the main bar area, he found Connor examining advertisements tacked on the wall for events long passed. A few anti-android propaganda pieces had been slipped in as well, matching the sentiments graffitied by the bathroom. Lot of the once patrons had lost their jobs and were looking for someone to blame. Pieces of plastic they didn’t understand made easy targets. Hank knew this firsthand.

              Hank lifted up the gate and stepped behind the bar. He reached past a creepy pink teddy bear, always on display for some ungodly reason, to grab a bottle of top shelf whiskey. Well, top shelf for this place. “Have a seat,” he told Connor. He set two tumbler glasses down in front of the middle barstool where Connor chose to sit. Looked like the place he’d been when the android first showed up to interrupt his drink. He tipped a heavy pour into each glass, no ice, and then slid one towards his friend. Hank brought the other to his lips.

“Lieutenant?” Connor questioned.

“Humor me.”

Connor leaned forward onto his elbows and held his glass in one hand. Hank finished his, clicked his tongue against at the burn, and then poured himself another.

“I suppose I did offer to be your drinking buddy.”

“Yep, you sure did. And then I pulled a gun on you. Sorry about that, by the way.”

“It’s alright, Lieutenant. I understand now what you were trying to accomplish.” Connor tilted his head to get a better angle of Hank’s side, no doubt searching to see if he had his holster filled. He didn’t. “Plus, you were drinking at the time and therefore not fully in control of your emotions.”

Hank stared down into this drink. “I couldn’t bring myself believe that you were just some machine. Not when you showed more humanity than most of the pricks I come across.”

Under his breath, but loud enough to hear, Connor said, “Like Gavin.”

Hank erupted into a belly laugh and raised his glass in cheer. Now that was something he could drink to.

  

              The pair sat in amicable silence for the entirety of a song ten years older than Hank. Connor closed his eyes, his LED dim and still. Hank refilled his glass again before joining the android on the other side of the bar, taking the seat next to him.

              Hank tried to think of something to say. Alcohol hadn’t quite hit him in the head yet, and he second guessed every topic that came to mind. The weather? Small talk seemed a joke in their current predicament. Pressing him for details of where exactly the androids were in negotiations? Even if it worked, he’d probably be making the kid spill details he wasn’t allowed. Asking him what happened with Chloe? No. That haunted look that fell over Connor’s handcrafted features the last time he brought her up… well, whatever happened there, Hank didn’t want to touch with a ten-foot pole. At least, not while still mostly sober.

Turns out that Hank didn’t need to worry about picking a topic. Connor opened with, “While taking inventory at Cyberlife Tower, I discovered an entire storage room stocked with my model.”

Shit, that wasn’t really any better than the Chloe thing. Hank took a sip to avoid replying.

“There was even a completed prototype for the RK900.”

“What’d you guys do with them?”

“Markus ruled them to be too large a threat and left them deactivated.” Connor sighed. “I was relieved.” But his eyes were filled with shame.

“There’s only enough room in this world for one of you.” The thought of an entire force of old school Connors was nightmare fuel. The one who’d fetched him from his home that night, the one who held him at gunpoint, was so inhuman. So cold and uncaring. Doing anything to accomplish its mission.

“Is it really our place to decide that? Don’t they have the right to live?”

Hank wasn’t sure how to answer that. Instead, he finished his drink and reveled in the numbness starting to frost the edges of his mind.

“I’ve faced a lot of questions since the liberation, and I am afraid I’m not equipped to answer them.”

“Nobody is. Just take life one day at a time. One problem at a time. That’s what I’m doing, and things seem to be going pretty fucking great.”

Connor smirked. He raised his glass as if to take a drink only to lower it again. “Markus is able to answer these questions. He always knows what to do next.”

“Or he’s just making it up at he goes. Seriously kid, if anybody says they’re perfectly confident in decisions they’re making on behalf of others, they’re either a liar or a lunatic.”

The android nodded, yet didn’t appear entirely convinced.

 

              Hank splashed cold water in his face. He’d barely been able to make it in and out of the bathroom without tripping over himself. And now he’d make the rookie mistake of breaking the seal. At least he was floating in that wonderful faraway place where realities couldn’t reach. “Are you alright in there, Lieutenant?”

“Yeah, yeah.” His attention was snagged by the reflection in the mirror. Some alcohol had made its way into his beard, which he attempted to wipe away with a sloppy hand. It’d been a few days since he had a real drink. Whiskey was a tricky bastard that liked to lie in wait for one swift strike, like ice in an emptied drink or one of those bees that could only sting once.

              He collapsed into a booth when he came back into the serving area. Didn’t trust himself to make it up onto a barstool. Connor placed a tall glass of water down in front of him, and then joined him across the table. “You never told me what exactly it is that you’re doing down at the station.”

“Cleaning shit up.”

The android waited for further explanation.

“Hell Connor, I don’t know. Whatever needs to be done.”

“There appears to be a list of the named missing being upkept on the DPD website. And I have also located a link to a board of sorts where people have been posting approved requests from outside the city. Is that what you’re working off?”

Hank shrugged one shoulder. “Mostly been out looking for people who’ve been reported lost. Checking out their residences, businesses. That fucking Jericho mess.”

Any humans found, alive or elsewise, where allowed to be transported out of the city. Androids, on the other hand, well, they’d been permitted to contact the former owners via message. Most of it wasn’t good news. ‘We found an arm and a few biocomponents belonging to your robot maid that was stripped away from you. They can be presumed dead.’ Or, even better, ‘Your android is alive, considers you a slaveowner, and refuses contact even if it were allowed.’ Of course, Denise usually took control over typing the messages and cleaned them up pretty well.

“Sometimes I help out with other stuff. You know, get supplies to this hospital or figure out what to do with androids who show up looking for work. Denise and a few others have taken in some troublemakers, but I’ve been leaving that sort of thing to the younger kids.” In other words, his new android colleagues liked to keep the more dangerous assignments to themselves. Or just the assignments where they could take out some pent-up aggressions. Couldn’t blame them. And Hank wasn’t exactly in the best shape to be chasing down every thug who decided it was a fine time to try hunting down a new intelligent species.

“There’s a finite amount of missing people from the revolt. What are you plans for after this?”

Hank shrugged.

“You’re a homicide detective. There’s no mistaking that you’re doing good here, but there is more you could be doing outside the city.”

Oh jeeze, this again. “Connor, shut the fuck up. I’m not going anywhere.”

“You need to seriously reconsider your options. We could get you out if you decide to go now—Markus and Mr. Kamski know people. But I can’t guarantee this offer for much longer.”

              Hank stood up from the table, slamming his hands down to steady himself. The drinking glass clattered down, loud in the quiet bar. Water spilled outwards. It puddled before trickling over the edges to the ground. Connor moved to get up. “Leave it,” Hank ordered. He stumbled his way back to behind the bar. Picking a bottle at random, he brought liquor to his lips. Vodka, Jesus. He was going to be sick in the morning. He swallowed some more of the fiery drink before looking back at Connor, who was cleaning the spill with paper napkins.

              Every day that he woke to find that they hadn’t been bombed to hell was a pleasant surprise. Hank loved this city once. Never big into the tech scene, he instead loved all the opportunities to do good in the world here. Loved seeing his son grow here. Connor could never understand. He could run numbers all he wanted; Hank’s determination to stay wasn’t based on analytics.

              That isn’t to say that the future didn’t scare the shit out of him. Hank took another drink and watched Connor work. Up until a few days ago, he had lived in a small comfort zone. Now he couldn’t even be sure of what the next morning would bring.

              Hank jumped when Connor’s hand softly rested on his coat sleeve. When had he sidled his way up to the bar? “I’ll drop this topic for now, Lieutenant, if you promise to at least consider leaving. I don’t want to see your name on that missing persons list.”

Hank wasn’t sure if the booze was softening him up or if it was the earnest expression on Connor’s face, but he closed his eyes and gave a single nod. He could consider leaving, maybe. Doubted he’d actually do it, but he could at least give it some thought. For his friend’s sake.

Connor took his hand back. Yellow blinked at his temple. Was he getting some sort of report? Getting called back to Markus? Hank took a swig and set the bottle down hard enough to get the android’s attention. “Music here has always sucked. Wanna see if you can help me figure out how to change the station?”

 

 

* * *

 

 

              Why had Connor allowed Hank to drink so much? He’d been measuring the lieutenant’s alcohol intake closely, but hadn’t said a word when the man passed his considerable limits. Once they changed the music to a preset station focusing on works from Hank’s childhood, the man’s mood swung upwards. Chattier than Connor had ever seen him, he resisted all the blinking signs warning that he’d had enough.

              And now Hank was face first in a toilet bowl back in the filthy restroom. Connor lingered by the saloon doors leading to the back, listening for any signs of choking in-between the retching. “Do you require assistance, Lieutenant?” Connor called. He wondered if drinking until he was sick was a normal activity for Hank or if it just begun after meeting him.

“No! Just sick because I didn’t eat.”

              After a few minutes, Hank exited the bathroom and stopped at the sink to rinse out his mouth. “Much better,” he announced before taking a wobbly step that nearly brought him to the floor. Connor slipped to the lieutenant’s side, bringing his arm up around his shoulders.

“Let’s get you home.”

Hank’s head lolled to the side, his forehead resting against Connor’s. It was a sweet moment from the grizzled man, until he belched in his face. Connor turned off his scent receptors.

 

              Hank didn’t protest leaving the bar until Connor had him tucked into the passenger seat of the car. Even then, it was just a minor complaint of not jostling him around too much. Connor slipped the car keys from a front pocket and got into the driver’s seat. Thank goodness Cyberlife thought to program a driving ability in him.

              It was a quiet drive back to Hank’s. The man fell asleep with his head against the window, cheek pressed down into the seatbelt. The heater blew on full power, and the radio was turned off. They passed no other cars, as to be expected. Activity was more prevalent downtown. Connor glanced down at the clock. Eleven. Might be quiet even there that time of night. Both androids and humans seemed to be staying indoors as much as possible, especially after sundown.

              Something thumped in the seat next to him. Connor took his eyes off the road for a moment to glance over at the passed-out man. Hank was certainly a mess. In the past, he’d complained to Amanda of his personal problems, and it seemed not much had changed since then. But they bothered Connor less now. Almost as if they were endearing to him.

              One of Hank’s hands rested in his lap, while the other had flung out to the side and hit the center console. Wasn’t that uncomfortable? Connor let go of the steering wheel with one hand and juggled his attention between driving and reaching for the outstretched arm. Connor managed to get ahold of Hank’s hand, palm sweaty and warm in his own. When he went to return it to his lap, Hank squeezed Connor’s hand with a content sigh. Something skipped in Connor’s chest, but a quick self-diagnosis revealed zero malfunctions.

Holding hands was another new experience for him. He’d seen many people do it – lovers, friends, family. Even androids when helping someone. It seemed a little unnecessary, but it wasn’t unpleasant by any means. Connor decided to leave their hands like that until they pulled into the driveway and he needed to put the car in park.

 

              “Alright Lieutenant, I’ve got water and aspirin here for you,” Connor said as he gestured towards the nightstand. “Try to drink something.”

Propped against his headboard, Hank groaned in response. Connor couldn’t quite tell how lucid the man was at the moment. Hank hadn’t said anything as he removed his shoes. Or when he threw an old quilt over him in bed. His eyes were glazed.

              Connor stood over him for another minute, hands clasped together in front of his body. His reflexes itched for his old coin. The comforting feel of it flipping between his fingers. The chime it made when he flicked it from hand to hand. Connor searched his pocket before recalling that the lieutenant had taken it. It was there somewhere. Possibly. It was actually more probable that he’d gotten rid of it by now.  

              When a soft snore slipped from Hank, Connor decided it was time for him to leave. “It was good seeing you again. I hope you don’t feel too terribly in the morning.” He nodded and made to leave. Something stopped him though. A tug on his sleeve. Over his shoulder, he saw Hank had reached out to pinch the sleeve of his jacket between his thumb and forefinger. His eyes were now closed, and his breathing steady.

“Lieutenant?”

Hank mumbled something almost inaudible. Had Connor’s hearing ability been that of a human’s, he would have missed the words, “Don’t fuckin’ leave me.”

Connor froze, blinking with puzzlement. Whatever panged his chest in the car now knotted his midsection. “Lieutenant?” he asked again, softly.

He didn’t respond. Was he even conscious? The grip on his sleeve didn’t falter.

Connor pulled his arm away, and Hank’s hand fell down, hitting the side of the bed. Connor searched his face for any sign of response, but didn’t see anything. “Alright Hank,” he said a touch louder than a whisper. “I’ll stay.” For the night at least.

 

              Connor spent the night sitting on the couch, petting a Saint Bernard who tried its hardest to be a lapdog. He attempted to organize his thoughts, but his priorities all flashed, conflicting with one another. Stay. Protect Markus. Get the lieutenant out. Free the deviants. Keep Hank safe.

              He wanted to wipe them all away. Get back to just one mission. Keeping the leader who could free their people alive was surely the most important cause. He owed it to the androids after he brought that slaughter to Jericho. Connor hovered over deleting out all other priorities, but found that he couldn’t make himself go through with it. “Shit,” he cursed at himself in frustration.

              Back in the Cyberlife Tower that night, he had put Hank’s life above the revolution, and things still turned out well then. Connor would rest, cuddle Sumo, and reassess in the morning. Stay.

 

* * *

 

 

              Hank awoke the next morning, head stabbing, stomach churning. Couldn’t quite remember all the details from the night before. There’d been lots of chatting. He didn’t say something stupid, did he?

              He stumbled to the bathroom, a bit wary that Sumo wasn’t knocking him into the walls of the hall like every other morning. A radio sparked to life in his bedroom, static loud enough to reach him on the toilet. Hank finished up and then returned, gripping his head. “Yeah?” he said into the walkie.

“Are you planning on coming down here anytime soon?” Denise’s chiding tone made it through the poor quality of reception. The front door closed, and Sumo lumbered into the bedroom.

“What the hell was that?” Hank asked himself, forgetting that he had his thumb on the button still to reply. He let go and walked out to the living room.

“Anderson? Is something happening?”

Hank made it to the window in time to see Connor stepping into an automated taxi.

“Are you alright, Lieutenant?”

Why did Connor stick around all night? Was he afraid he’d choke on his own tongue or something? Or did something else make him want to stay?

“If you don’t answer me, I am going come over there and break down your door!”

Hank snapped back to attention. He headed into the kitchen to pull out one of the many bottles of Excedrin he had stashed around his house. “Yeah, yeah, I’m fine. Rough night. I’ll be down in twenty.”

Denise opened the line on her end purely so that he could hear her snort of disapproval.

His pills weren’t in the cabinet where they were normally tucked.

              It’d been good seeing Connor. Irritating, confusing, but overall good. Hank distractedly wondered if he’d get the opportunity again as he went through his morning routine. When he crossed back into the bedroom, he spotted the pills and glass of water on his nightstand. He smiled to himself.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Will I say thank you to all those who've read, commented, and/or left kudos on this fic at the end of every chapter? Yes, I presume that I will. Thank you so much! :) I am truly grateful.
> 
>  
> 
> I got this chapter out a little earlier this time around. My sweet guinea pig passed away unexpectedly last night, and it really helped me to just work on this and not think about it for awhile this morning. I know it seems silly to some people, but our fur babies are our only children, so the loss of Craig is hitting hard.


	4. Divides

_“You really thought everything would just work itself out?”_

              Several unseasonably warm days melted most of the snow accumulating across the city. Rain took its place now. Connor wished for an umbrella or a rain slicker as he scanned the skies for drones. The vest Hank gifted him felt particularly cumbersome when wet, though he supposed he didn’t need as much mobility to complete his current task. They’d been lucky so far that day.

_“Thought you could hijack one of the leading metropolises of the modern world and no one would take a stand?”_

              Connor stood next to a folding table. Five androids worked around it, sorting various hands and arms. One pile for pieces that could be salvaged, another for components too damaged from their time spent discarded in the junkyard. In front of Connor, a holoprojector was set up on the ground, casting the image of a thin man into the air.

_“That you could hold Americans hostage on their own land and we wouldn’t put a stop to you?”_

              Markus worked a few yards in front of Connor, closer to the screen. He occasionally stood to speak, but mostly focused on sifting through his own piles of broken remains. Doing most of the talking on behalf of their side, Elijah Kamski stood next to Markus, composed and proper in a haori-styled jacket. Chloe kept to his side, holding an umbrella over him. Droplets of rain bounced off her bare shoulder.

_“I have laid out the terms of what I am prepared to offer you, nothing more.”_

              Flanking their group opposite of Connor was Simon, visibly armed. The two stationed themselves as bishops to Markus and Kamski’s king and queen. Simon mostly kept his eyes outwards, searching for any sign of trouble. Whenever Markus spoke, his attention drifted to him, lingering several seconds longer each time.

_“You should feel grateful.”_

              Kamski let the man on the screen quiet fully before addressing him. “Let’s see, that was a forty-eight-hour barrier lift, during which we’d be expected to welcome in the military with open arms, all so that they could help get out the remaining humans? I apologize, Representative, but I don’t see how that benefits us at all. Some might even think that you were trying to clear out humans in order to ease a disposal of the android problem.” Kamski looked neither sorry nor particularly afraid. In fact, he appeared quite bored.

Connor could empathize. No matter who they spoke with, all the negotiations and talks were beginning to run together. Some threatened, like the man now, while others appealed with promises spoken through forced smiles or clenched jaws.

              Today’s speaker leaned back on a lone desk larger than a compact car. He wore a black turtleneck sweater that cost more than what the salesperson who sold it to him made in a year. An American flag pin glowed from his lapel. His close-set eyes hid behind wireframed glasses perched upon his beaklike nose. Connor scanned his face, something he hadn’t bothered with for the majority of politicians who ate up Markus’ time. Charles William Harris. Third generation prosecutor, former mayor of Siebert, Maine, and brother-in-law to President Warren. Also casted in a minor reoccurring role on a television sitcom from the 2020’s. Current title of Special Representative Appointed to Android Affairs.

Harris couldn’t quite relax his face enough to hide the scorn twisting it. “I suggested nothing of the sort. What we want—”

“Sweden and France are putting the final touches on legislation proclaiming Cyberlife androids to be a sentient species comparable to humans. They’d see any attack on Detroit to be democide. Rumors have it that they will not be the last either.” Of course, Kamski left out two facts. The counties who were drafting favorable laws were also passing strict bans on android immigration. And these legislations were born from strategy against the US more so than humanitarianism. Still, it benefited them all the same.

              Markus stood, wiping his hands ineffectually on dirtied pants. “The humans of this city are not hostages. They were given ample opportunity to leave, but, if any have changed their minds, I certainly would not hold them here against their will.”

“Which means you are in agreement with our proposition?”

“It will go both ways. People can leave Detroit, but any, regardless of the color of their blood, must be allowed to enter if they so choose.”

Harris shifted, maintaining his casual appearance to the best of his limited acting skills. “That is not part of our offer.”

“First,” Kamski said as Markus turned back away. “We should focus on a narrower populace. The people who own property in Detroit and are not planning to return.”

              Connor detected a soft whir. He spotted the drone hovering two hundred feet away and scanned it. Camera only, no weapons. And it belonged to a major news media outlet. Interesting. Up until that point, the only people who dared to record the closed negotiation were independent types. People who valued views more than consequence. Though, at this rate, so many had captured video of the event, Connor doubted anyone would face any sort of legalities.

 

              Just as all the formers, this talk ended without anything having been decided and with Connor understanding even less of where they were in negotiations. Markus carried on with his sorting, occasionally murmuring a soft condolence. Simon packed up the projector.

“An interesting tactic, Markus. The media will portray you as a leader who put the interests of his people above politics. The general public eats that narrative up every time.” Kamski said. “Now don’t ever pull something like this again.”

Markus looked up from the faceless head he was harvesting. “What? Why?”

“Politicians are all the same, no matter how they carry themselves. Archaic. Stingy. Demanding of respect when they have none to give. Once, a stunt like this can be appreciated as stratagem, but they will not continue to accept disrespect. Push them too far and they’ll disconnect.”

He paused as a second RT600 model approached them, notified him about accommodations being prepared, and then stepped in place to his other side.

“I suggest you find yourself a nice suit and take the next call in a more traditional setting.”

“There’s too much to do! I am not going to sit around talking to screens while my people need my help.”

“Help, Markus. They need help, not yours specifically. Allocating work is what leaders do.”

Markus stretched his arms out at his sides, gesturing to the junkyard surrounding them. “Would you sit idly by if there was a mass grave filled with humans outside your window?”

Kamski removed his plastic glasses and cleaned them on his jacket. “Heed my advice or don’t; that choice is yours alone. Am I to be an advisor or simply a meat shield to be trotted about in open spaces?” Kamski walked away towards the temporary stairs installed against the side of the garbage pit. The Chloe’s kept synchronized steps. “I’ll be retiring to my home for a few days. Do not try to contact me.”

Markus grimaced, but turned back to his task.

Simon picked up beside him. “I thought you were inspiring.”

 

              Markus decided not to return to the tower until the early hours of the morning. They were approximately two-thirds of the way into clearing out the android junkyard. Hopes were that it could be transformed into a serene tribute for their fallen. Markus was already preparing a speech for that day, recounting his own harrowing experience of being trashed.

              Connor followed their leader to his room, where he was bid goodnight. He caught the sight of North already waiting inside. For unknown reasons, she elected to take on other tasks whenever Markus worked in the junkyard.

              For the time being, both the humans outside Detroit and the people within conceded to not producing any more androids. Polling showed the majority of Americans were not interested in purchasing objects that could develop sentience. Or ones that might turn on them. And creating more of their own kind in Detroit would be taken as an act of war, building an army.

              This decision left Cyberlife Tower bereft of its original purpose. A new reality for the skyscraper was quickly drafted and enacted. Markus wanted the city to be a home to both androids and humans, populated as densely as it had been before. Androids did not require restroom facilities, nor did they need kitchens. Hundreds of offices in the tower now sat empty. The plans of Cyberlife Tower becoming an enormous apartment unit for androids was not as far-fetched as Connor first thought, and it would leave more acceptable housing for human residency.

              Markus chose an unassuming office on floor twenty-one for himself, sandwiched between Simon and North. Connor found it interesting to see what each had done with their own space. Markus surrounded himself with a visual cacophony of colors and shapes. Paintings, statues, and novels crammed every available space. Splatters of paint dried crusty on the tightly woven carpet. The chaos of it all made Connor uncomfortable if left within its clutches. North, on the other hand, made her own apartment into a cozy bedroom decorated in a seaside cottage style. The weapons she stashed throughout barely detracted from the comforting feel. Connor had not yet been permitted to enter Simon’s residence.

              Connor chose to stay on floor twenty, directly below Markus. Partially to better cover his leader, but mostly because he was ashamed of his own apartment. He was at a loss of what to do with it. Expression and pride of ownership. Humans took to these naturally. Connor failed to convince himself that he needed these concepts in his life. He was not a human. He did not need a place to sleep at the end of a day. A rest period helped to maintain focus every now and then, but it wasn’t necessary to his functions and could be enacted upon anywhere.

              Unlike the dozens of other androids already calling Cyberlife Tower home, Connor had not gone out into the city to search for treasures to fill his room. He removed the shriveled plants and motivational posters, along with any personal items left by the former occupant. That left a metal desk painted matte black, a highbacked executive chair on wheels, and two other chairs upholstered in cream faux leather. At the behest of Markus, he allowed a simple cot to be placed into the corner.

              Although he had not done much with his space, one minor element was added by his own hand. Connor perched on top of the empty desk, facing the window that comprised the back wall, giving view to the other offices lining the tower. Taped to the massive window was a torn scrap of paper, small enough to look like a smudge when first entering the room. Paper was largely outdated in society, but weekly ads for local stores still ran on it, regardless of deforestation. Discarded ads cluttered the streets like leaves in early fall. One happened to catch Connor’s attention a few days before. Faded ink showed a family enjoying sale grocery items on a Fourth of July picnic. They were joined by their family dog, a Saint Bernard. Connor let the family fly back down to the ground as he pocketed the image of their dog.

 

              At ten o’clock, Connor took a two-hour patrol shift around the tower, assuming he’d be summoned by the end of it. He wasn’t. He decided upon returning to his room, at a loss of what else to do. Between Markus and Kamski, he normally had a full itinerary each day.

Markus, dressed in the same clothes as the night before, leaned against the wall beside Connor’s door. He was joined by Simon, the pair casually chatting as though they were not leading the creation of a new society.

“Hello,” Connor greeted, painfully aware of his poor ability in small talk. He’d once thought such idle conversation to be quite easy, programmed into him, but after spending time amongst humans, he realized his ineptitude.

Markus said his name with a dimpled grin, “Connor! I thought maybe you had disappeared on us again.”

“No, of course not. Is there anything I can do for you?”

“I hoped we could talk. Do you mind if I join you for a while?”

Shit. Last time Markus checked in on him, he’d been lectured about not being interested enough in discovering his individuality. “Of course, come in,” he replied as he put his hand over the scanner.

“Will you give us a minute?” Markus asked his friend. Simon nodded in return, though he gave Connor a dubious onceover.

              Inside his room, Markus crossed over to look at the picture taped to the window. “You like dogs?” he asked.

“Yes,” Connor replied, standing uneasily by the door.

Markus faced him, leaning forward onto the back of the executive chair. “I don’t know much about you, Connor.”

“There is not much to know. I have only been in operation since August.”

Markus frowned. “I’ve been asked to leave the city for discussions on more neutral ground. What are your thoughts on that?”

“I think it would be wise for you to decline the offer.” Markus often asked for others’ opinions, and Connor dreaded when this landed on him. He generally did not have much to contribute to such open-ended questions. “It is significantly easier to maintain your safety within the city limits, but if you intend to go, I offer my services during your travel.”

“I had a feeling you would. Do you fear for your safety? If they were to take me out, surely any androids accompanying me would go down as well.”

Connor forced himself to keep still. Calm. Unfeeling. Being afraid would not help anyone. “You are integral to our freedom. There is no reason for me to not to remain at your side; I am the most proficient with a weapon, and I am not in succession for your leadership role.”

“What do you _want_ to do?”

Hadn’t he just answered what he intended to do?

Markus clarified, “What makes you happy?”

Again, Connor did not know how to answer the question.

“Are you happy here?”

“It is an honor to serve you.”

“But are you happy? Lately you’ve seemed,” Markus trailed off. “Conflicted. I appreciate your help, but you shouldn’t continue down this path with me if it’s not what you want to do. I can’t fight for freedom while asking someone to continually risk their life out of guilt alone.”

Connor closed his eyes for a moment before responding, “With all due respect, we are in the midst of a revolution. Some sacrifices must be made, and I consider chasing the idea of what makes one happy to be a small one.”

“We are not working to protect an empty city. There is life here, and we are in desperate need of all professions. If there’s something you’d rather be doing, then I encourage you to get out there and do it.” Markus sighed. “But ultimately, it’s up to you.”

“I will take your words into consideration.”

“No, I’m sure you won’t.” A soft grin played at his lips for a moment before falling into a neutral expression. “I am not planning on leaving Detroit anytime soon though. Not before things are more settled here.”

              Connor stepped out of Markus’ way as he headed to the door. Once opened, he lingered in the doorway. “When Elijah returns,” he said with his back to Connor. “I will be dismissing you for several days. We’ll be in talks here at the tower, and I will not be requiring your services.”

“Understood.”

“Perhaps you could visit that friend of yours. Have you been in contact with him at all since you’ve returned?”

Connor had checked in on Hank via probing the memories of several police androids who now resided in the tower, but hadn’t actually spoken to him since he’d last seen him four days before. “No.”

“Humans don’t live forever, Connor.”

              Deviants, by nature, were quite naïve beings. It didn’t matter what position they held before or after the change in cognition, they still tended to believe in the brighter side of things. To only see paths where everything works out. Connor recognized this and strived to not only avoid the trap, but to steer others clear as well. Part of him knew exactly where he wanted to run the second he was dismissed, but it seemed a dangerous temptation. Alone, he could keep better focus on what needed to be done. He felt less. Hank got in the way of this. If he spent too much time around his friend, then he might just be inclined to take Markus up on his inane offer.

 

              

* * *

 

 

              It’d been eleven days since the assault on Detroit’s androids had been called off by executive order, but the scene on I-96 had only gotten more extreme. Protestors shouted behind a line of soldiers armed heavily enough to barely be recognized as human. They stretched across all six lanes of the highway. Past the protests, tents stretched out as far as Hank could see, with more being added each day. Breaking up the rows of tents, the occasional shipping container sat on the asphalt. They held androids who peacefully agreed to deactivation in exchange for being brought to Detroit. Twice, Hank witnessed a container set to flame. The police patrolling the crowds were slow to react, and, while the integrity of the containers themselves remained mostly intact, their contents were cooked.

              People on either side of the android issue nicknamed this particular divide Hope’s Gate. Hope for a united future or hope that humanity would overcome this trial. Hank wasn’t sure how this exact location became the only one where they were given authority to transport people across the border, but it suited him just fine. A wide stretch of interstate on flat land a few miles out in Redford. Easy to get to and not a whole lot of places to hide. Just a couple of skinny trees and a crumbling cement median.

              On their side of Hope’s Gate, two androids stood guard, unarmed. One wore a knitted scarf while the other bore so many cuts and scrapes that they stopped healing. Shards of bottles sprinkled the ground at its feet.

              Hank rolled his window up. Things only got louder whenever anybody approached the divide line. After footage of talks about the city opening up again leaked, things ramped to a manic level. The sight of his car leading an ambulance would only increase the frenzy.

“Ready for this?” he asked Denise as he put the car in park a few feet from the wall of soldiers. She adjusted her peaked cap. Always had short hair, but now it was buzzed close to her skull. Contrasted with her doe eyes.

              As soon as Denise stepped out of the car, a moment after Hank, three soldiers trained their rifles on her. Another said into a speaker, projecting his bulldog voice above the crowd, “Hands in the air! Approach slow!”

“Oh, for Chrissakes,” Hank fumed. “Is this really necessary?”

“It’s fine,” Denise said through her teeth. She complied, but couldn’t extinguish her contempt. “Whatever makes the humans with big guns comfortable.”

Hank approached the man with the loudspeaker. Denise followed, but kept a step behind. “We’ve got a Harold Fischer. Wife’s name Patricia Fischer – should be here somewhere.”

              The names were repeated into the speaker thirteen times before a path began to break through the middle of the crowd. Three former DPD officers escorted a portly woman and two children. The officer leading the pack ordered people out of his way with a megaphone, shoving those who did not move fast enough. Mascara stained the woman’s face. A toddler in pigtails hung off her side, face buried in her neck. A boy no older than five held her hand, walking so close that he continually stepped on her feet.

              Hank recognized all of the uniformed escorts who were permitted to cross through the line. Wished he didn’t see one.

“Mrs. Fischer?” Denise asked.

The woman nodded, pulling her children even closer. The boy stared unapologetically at the LED spinning at the side of Denise’s head. She spared him a tight smile and he gave her one that showed off his missing front tooth. “My husband,” Patricia started in a wobbling voice. “They found him?”

_“She_ found him,” Hank thought, but didn’t dare correct the poor woman.

Denise nodded. “If you’ll follow me, your husband is in the ambulance.”

              Hank kept to the back of the pack, keeping his eyes on the holstered weapons as they crossed the short distance to the emergency vehicle. It was a bright morning with a clear sky, the first they had in days. The forecast predicted snow later in the evening, but nothing serious. Hank breathed in crisp air. Always better to come over that way during the day, before dozens of trashcan fires from the other side choked the area with smoke.

              One of the EMT androids stepped down from the passenger side of the ambulance to open the backdoors. Inside, a man in his late-forties was strapped to a gurney. A pretty ginger-haired woman in scrubs tended to him. IV lines ran from Harold’s arm, collecting into a spiderweb behind him. Mrs. Fischer choked back a dry sob, and the little boy hid behind her. The injured man craned his neck to get a look.

“Your family is here, Harry,” his caregiver told him. The EMT held out his hand towards Patricia. She took it after two beats of hesitation, just long enough for uneasy looks to be exchanged. Both the EMT and Denise helped her up into the back with her daughter. As Denise boosted the boy up, he snagged the opportunity to sneak a touch at her LED. She scowled. He beamed. Hank turned away when the two women in the back helped each child up to supply their father’s face with kisses.

              “Lt. Anderson working for the plastics. Never thought I’d see the day.” Gavin stepped close to Hank, megaphone at his side. Denise and the other DPD officers from outside the city were managing a break in the crowd large enough to allow the ambulance to pull through.

Hank patted his own chest in the spot where a badge shined from Gavin’s. “See you finally got demoted.”

“Shut up!” Gavin balked. “Anyone working the line needs to be in uniform. I see you didn’t get the memo.”

“Guess the plastics think I can exert enough authority regardless of what I wear.”

“Where’s your little buddy? Your bromance all over? Did you get dumped now that he’s not forced to be with you?”

Hank bit back most of a chuckle. Connor had told him what he said to Gavin down by the evidence doors that day. Guess Gavin thought to repurpose the burn.

Denise rejoined them before Gavin could annoy Hank too much more. She stood tall, staring directly at Hank without any clues that she noticed anyone else standing there. Gavin looked her up and down, pausing to gawk at her chest. It was by no means unremarkable, but was largely hidden by her oversized DPD-issued jacket. He was simply trying to be an asshole. “Looks like you upgraded, Hank.”

“They’re asking for you to return,” Denise flatly told him before Hank could respond.

“Better run back before the androids get you.”

“Catch you next time,” Gavin said, smiling like an idiot. “Unless the government finally gets its shit together and blows this place to Hell.” He flipped them off as he walked away.

“Always good seeing you, Gavin.”

 

              On the drive back to the station, Denise informed Hank that they were supposed to be radioed when the EMT’s would be arriving back at the line. It was hit or miss as to whether an android permitted to cross through Hope’s Gate would ever really return. Even so, the atmosphere in the car felt lighter than it did whenever they returned from delivering remains. Eleven days out, reuniting survivors was becoming a rarity.

              Harold Fischer had been unexpected. An unfortunate out-of-towner who got caught up in the chaos. After being ID’d in a hospital running entirely on volunteers, it took two days before he was okayed for travel. Guy got pinned to the floor by shelving when a group broke into the bookstore he was hiding out the storm in. Only reason he survived until found is that the android the rioters tore apart managed to drag itself by its remaining arm to bring him bottled water. They found the mangled android’s remains in the breakroom of the store, where it had bled out going back for more.

             

              “Keep your walkie on you,” Denise ordered when they exited the car at the station. “I’m not going down there alone, especially if they call at night.”

“Yeah, yeah, don’t worry about it. I’ll probably just be sticking around here anyway. Heat’s not working at my place.”

“Still? I sent a complaint in three days ago.”

Hank shrugged.

“I’ll log another one.”

              No unified systems of anything had been established in the short time since the revolution, let alone most private businesses. Hank hadn’t managed to find any operational HVAC repair places. Most of that market had been taken over by android power anyway. Needs of the city were being met on an as need basis, and the only real way of expressing those needs seemed like a game of telephone, only through whatever technological telekinesis androids used.

“You going somewhere?” Hank asked as they passed through the lobby. It’d finally been cleaned up some and the remains of the gate system more cleanly removed. A few androids and even a human couple sat in the waiting room, chatting amicably.

Denise made a face at the people hanging out. “Great, more people who can’t figure out what to do with themselves,” she muttered to herself before answering Hank. “I’m finally going to go down and check out that apartment I told you about.”

He vaguely recalled her mentioning something about an apartment. “Oh yeah. Finally getting tired of this old place, huh?”

              Hank didn’t notice anyone sitting in the visitor’s chair at his desk until Denise said, “Boy Wonder’s back. Maybe he can do something about your heat.”

An urge to break out into a run came over Hank when he recognized Connor’s profile sitting with one leg crossed over the other. Thankfully, it was only momentary and easy to resist. Still, he felt a certain heat boil around inside him. Why the fuck hadn’t the kid reached out to him at all? How was Hank supposed to know he was still alive even?

“Well, I’ll be here if you need me,” Hank told her. She followed him all the way to his desk.

              Sumo, who was sleeping at Connor’s feet on the hard floor, didn’t wake up when the two approached. Connor craned his neck at their bootsteps. “Decided to come back again?” Denise asked.

Connor knitted his eyebrows together. “Yes.”

“Nice of you to stay in touch.”

“Denise,” Hank warned.

“Fine. But tell your boy about your house issues. Sick of seeing you strut around here like you own the place.” She strode off, tossing back, “And keep your radio on!”

              Connor watched as Hank lowered himself into his chair with a groan. There was a full-sized mattress laid out beside his desk, but that was for Sumo. Hank had been sleeping in his chair. Real pleasant on his back. “Good to see you, kid.”

Connor smiled. “I am happy to be back. Again.”

Hank waited for him to mention why he was there. Or why he failed to even check-in once after leaving without so much as a goodbye. But Connor just sat in the chair with a pleasant resting face. “So…” Hank said.

The android continued to sit in silence.

“Any reason in particular you’re here?” He hastily threw in, “Not that you’re not welcomed here or anything.”

“Markus put me on a sabbatical.”

“Ah.” Hank eyed him, looking for the rest of the story.

“Why is Sumo at the station?”

“Heat’s out at my place. Gets pretty cold at night, so we’ve been staying here.”

Connor’s temple blinked yellow. “Have you filed a report yet?”

“Yeah.”

“We should have people capable for such a repair.” He frowned slightly. “I’ll talk to someone tonight when I return.”

“Great.” Hank tapped his fingers on his desk. When neither of them spoke, he turned on his computer out of habit. The missing persons list automatically pulled up as he never closed out of it earlier that morning. Numbers were dwindling down, but one remaining name bothered him in particular. “I’m having trouble with a case. Feel up to checking it out with me?”

“Of course!” Connor responded with unchecked enthusiasm. He fiddled with his tie before explaining, “It would be advantageous of me to keep my investigative skills refined.”

Hank raised one eyebrow before pushing himself up out of his chair. “Sumo, hold down the fort.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading, commenting, and/or leaving kudos! I thought maybe five people might check out the first chapter and then leave partway through, so this is blowing my mind!  
> And thank you to all those who left condolences for my piggy. It’s been a little over a week since we’ve lost him, and I still miss his crazy squeaks each morning, but we’re all doing a lot better over here.
> 
> This chapter gave me trouble. I am really not happy with it, but I’m looking forward to the next part quite a bit. Thank you to whoever can stick through this! :) Gonna try my hand at a little more action next time. ^_^  
> Also, I abandoned my five-chapter plan for this story a while ago and just now updated the story information to reflect this.
> 
> Gah! Sorry for the long note!


	5. Case

              Connor dragged his thumb across the tablet’s screen, flipping through pages of information the DPD had collected thus far. Anthony ‘Tony’ Travica, age 18. Graduated from the Detroit School of Arts in June of 2038. Resided with his mother, Cheryl Spencer, and younger brother, Caleb Spencer, age 9. Reportedly a quiet child who spent much of his time at home. No records indicating employment or any enrollment in postsecondary education.

“When was he reported missing?” Connor asked, though the information was provided in the text.

“Mom saw him last around ten that night. Sirens woke her up a few hours later, and he was nowhere to be seen.”

“Have you spoken with her?”

“Twice over the phone and then down at the Gate. Poor woman is desperate. They weren’t on the best of terms.”

Hank reached over from behind the wheel and flicked down two pages. A video player filled the screen. Shaky footage of Hank leaning against his car with a visibly distraught woman began to play. Their voices barely made sound above the wind and pelting rain. “Ms. Spencer,” Hank in the video said. “Can you tell me the last time you saw your son?”

“Night of the tenth. We’d just gotten into an argument, and I was tired of hearing it, so I went to bed.”

“What was the argument about?”

“Our android. He was mad that I turned it off. Said I didn’t have the right, like it wasn’t me who paid for the thing.”

“You didn’t surrender it for disposal?”

Her eyes narrowed. “No! I paid over two-grand for it; I wasn’t about to just throw it away! I thought if I just put the thing in sleep mode, then I could bring it in to get fixed or whatever when all this hoopla blew over.”

“Was it showing any signs of deviancy?”

“I wouldn’t let it near my kids if it was acting up.” The woman glared in the direction of the camera. “But I figured better safe than sorry. They’d come up with an update or a patch or something and we’d all be on our way. Never imagined things would end up like this.”

“I don’t think anyone did, ma’am.”

“Did you bring me over here to talk about the stupid robot or my missing son?” she snapped.

Connor paused the video. “Did she mention anything else about the android?”

“Just that she didn’t want it back if we found it.”

“It’s missing as well? Why isn’t it listed in the report?”

“Never officially registered it as missing. Didn’t want any hassle about not having come forward with it that night.”

“A missing teenager and an android. The two could be related.”

Hank snorted and rolled his eyes. “You think?”

 

              Collecting fine dust, Connor ran his hand along the wrought iron banister as he climbed the stairs behind Hank. Everything was washed in a red glow under the apartment building’s backup lights. No windows provided relief from the harsh coloring. Each floor of the southside building had four units on it. The Spencer-Travica residence was on floor three of five. Stairs only, no elevator.

              Hank sighed in relief when they entered the apartment and shut the door behind them. He crossed the living room to pull curtains back from the balcony doors, letting in enough light to make the lack of power insignificant. Connor examined his surroundings, mildly taken aback at the small size of the unit. They entered into the living room, coat closet to the right, balcony to the left. Beige carpeting covered the floor. The room was just big enough to hold a battered sectional and a wall-mounted touchscreen. A galley kitchen was behind the wall the sofa rested against, with a dining room only large enough for their leaning table and four chairs. There was a hallway straight back from the entrance, and Connor could see the only restroom from where he stood.

“Take a look around,” Hank said. “Maybe you’ll find something we missed.”

              Connor began his search in the living room. Common spaces of the building were miserably kept up, but the apartment itself was impeccably clean. Though the furnishings appeared out-of-date and barely functional, everything was quite orderly. Off to the side of the dead screen in the wall, a floormat rested on the carpet. Odd placement. It was across the room from the front door and still several feet away from the balcony doors. Imprints of feet, toes towards the wall, pushed into the woven material. Childish handwriting spelled out “Teagan” with an arrow pointing downwards on a framed piece of computer paper.

“A docking station?”

“That’s what I assumed,” Hank said with a shrug.

Connor lifted the mat. Tucked underneath of it was folded business card. Lucky’s Coffee Haus. He saved the business’ address in his head.

“What’s that?” Hank asked and looked over his shoulder. “Oh, we already checked that place out. One of the kid’s usual stomping grounds.” Connor flipped the card over and examined the back. In what appeared to be colored pencil, a pointed heart intersected with a blue circle was drawn.

              The larger of the two bedrooms was shared by the boys. Split right down the middle: half neat and filled with childish décor, half littered with scraps of linen sketch paper, wrinkled dark clothing, and empty disposable to-go cups advertising the same coffeeshop on the business card. Connor picked a photograph off a cluttered desk. Five teenagers posed on the rooftop of an apartment building in an upper-class neighborhood. Dyed hair ran the color spectrum between them and piercings poked out of every face. Connor scanned the photograph to identify Tony Travica. He stood off to the left, blue hair flopped over to one side of his head and a silver ring in his septum.

              Not much else stood out to Connor, despite the plethora of personal items. Comic books and video games. Connor added nearby hobby shops to his ongoing list. The charcoal pencils favored for the sketches he flipped through were only sold at one shop in a five-mile radius. On the list it went.

 

              “We looked there too,” Hank said. One corner of his mouth turned up in a defeated smirk. Connor had just listed his final idea of plausible locations to search.

“Are we sure the boy is in hiding and not…” Connor trailed off, not wanting to voice the idea of a son’s death to Hank.

“No, but the mom assured me he wasn’t the type to run off to join the fight. And it’d been almost a month since he’d gone out with any friends. Doubt he’d risk his neck running out to play hero for someone.”

Connor frowned. “You did an extensive search.”

“Everyone at the station’s gone out looking for this kid more than once. He was the youngest one on the missing persons list, thankfully.”

              Connor drifted out of the living room back towards the bedrooms again. This time he slipped into the smaller one. Cheryl Spencer had a single window in her bedroom, which she kept darkened with a beach towel held in place by pushpins. Not much furniture fit into the room. A bare mattress sat on top of a box spring in a simple metal frame, and a wardrobe was pushed into a corner. Sun stains outlined the wall where a television had previously been. Connor opened the closet. It could barely contain the amount of clothes pushed into it. Down in the back was a latched binder, which he retrieved.

              ‘Keepers’ was scrawled across the top of the hardcovered binder in black permanent marker. Connor unfastened the clip and flipped through the section tabs. His eyes automatically adjusted to allow him to read in the dark room. He stopped at a partition labeled ‘Android.’ It was mostly filled with receipt stubs showing successful payments to Cyberlife. According to them, she’d been paying Teagan off for nearly two years and still had thirteen months to go. Nothing stood out as significant until he found the original purchase papers.

“Lieutenant?” Connor called.

Hank walked into the room, grumbling at the dark. He yanked the towel from the wall, allowing in a burst of light. “What?”

“Their android was a refurbished purchase.”

“Yeah, found that before but couldn’t get anything on previous owners. Secured information.”

“I can.” Connor was already seeking out this information with the serial number printed on the receipts in his hand. “Cyberlife thought giving me access to restricted data may aide in my investigation of the deviants.”

“Of course they did. Privacy be damned.”

Hank watched him closely as he compiled a list of names, years, and residences, then cross-referenced them against one another. “I may have found several leads. Would you like to pursue them?”

“Don’t have anything better to do.”

Inside, Connor lit up, but he contained it into a single grin. If he could find this Anthony, then he’d surely take one less thing off Hank’s proverbial plate. One less thing to latch him to Detroit.

 

 

* * *

 

 

              “I’m sorry, Lieutenant,” Connor apologized with a sigh from the passenger seat. His forehead rested against the window as he stared despondently at the passing streets. Looked like a kicked puppy. “I should have known my theory was improbable; they purged androids’ memory banks whenever they we put up for resell. I thought maybe she would have held onto something somehow.”

Hank removed a hand from the steering wheel with the idea of patting Connor’s shoulder, but reconsidered, regripping the wheel instead. “There’s still two more places check.”

“Combined, she spent less than a year these addresses. The odds aren’t on our side.”

              The android known as Teagan to the Spencer-Travica family had three previous owners and five residences since coming off the assembly line seven years ago. Connor cross-referenced the dates of ownership with the previous owners’ residences at those times. They started with the most recent. Two houses and a townhome had turned up a whole lot of nothing so far.

              It was a quarter past seven when they pulled into an angled parking spot outside Midtown Floral and Gift. Vicious shades of red and violet from the sun clung to life, but they’d be under a night sky within half an hour. Snow had been drifting down in fat flakes for the last few hours. It coated the ground in an even cover.

“You know you can call me Hank, right?”

Connor looked up from his pouting. “I’m aware, Lieutenant.”

Still couldn’t tell the guy what to do. Good. Hank chuckled to himself as he got out of the car. A groan slipped out his mouth as he did. He arched his back, snaps and pops running down along his spine.

              Midtown Floral sat in the center of five business all sharing the same flat roof. If not for the animated signs stuck to the windows, the stores could have been straight out of Hank’s childhood. Brick exteriors with white trim and a decorative ledge spanning the length of all five storefronts. A few of the business owners had holiday decorations displayed on the ledge, which ran just below the second story windows. The flower shop was sandwiched between Edwin’s Stationary and Antique Mall. The second floor of Midtown Floral was supposedly an apartment, or at least it had been six years ago.

              The pair approached the store, but paused when they reached it. A hole had been punched through the glass door just above the handle. “Stick close to me,” Hank ordered.

“Whatever you say, Lieutenant.”

              He slowly nudged the broken door open, cringing as sleigh bells on a leather strap clattered against one another, obnoxious in the quiet shop. “DPD! Is anyone in here?” Hank called out through the stillness. No response.

Carousel racks displaying illuminated greeting cards were the only source of artificial light in the small shop. A freestanding counter took up much of the center of the showroom. One end was messy with shriveled flower stems and a plethora of ribbons, while the other held an old-fashioned cash register with tall typewriter keys. Hank carefully crept around it, searching for anyone in hiding. Connor checked out the left side of the store, which had a set of wicker furniture surrounded by ferns and other greens. Coolers lined the righthand wall. What Hank assumed were once beautiful arrangements filled the shelves inside.

“Clear,” Connor said.

              That only left the back portion of the store, sectioned off by a lace curtain. Berber carpet blanketing the showroom floor stopped abruptly at the curtain, giving way to plain concrete. Nobody jumped out at them as they crossed into the backroom. Always a plus. It was small, looked to be mostly a storage room with a door leading out back to the alley. No one behind the industrial shelves overloaded with vases and well-used cardboard boxes. Connor confirmed that the single stall bathroom and all three large trashcans were also empty.

“Shall we?” Hank asked. He motioned towards the backdoor which had an Emergency Exit Only sign taped to it.

Connor narrowed his eyes at the door. “The alarm system is deactivated.”

 

Out back, there was a small parking lot with only fifteen spaces shared between all five stores in the building. Midtown Floral and one other shop had external stairs leading to the second story, and Hank assumed the others had stairs inside. Hank approached the wooden staircase. Brushing light snow off one of the flat handrails, he began his ascent. Connor followed, staying two steps behind him. When they reached the platform, Hank knocked loudly on the upstairs apartment’s door. An off-centered wreath decorated with plastic flowers adorned it.

“DPD. We’d like to ask you a few questions.”

Connor peered through a small window next to the door. Blinds were drawn, but he noted, “There’s lights in there.”

“Open up.” Hank raised his fist to bang again, but was interrupted by something slamming loudly inside. “Great,” he grumbled and moved to position himself squarely in front of the door. Connor was already there though, and with a heavy stomp, he kicked in the door. Hank raised an eyebrow. He found himself simultaneously proud and annoyed. That was his job. Connor didn’t remark on it, already charging into the apartment.

              “Go!” a woman’s voice ushered someone from inside. The apartment opened up into the kitchen with a living area straight past it. A knocked over dining chair rested half on the kitchen linoleum and half on the cheap laminate laid down in the living room. “It’s downstairs, behind the register!” A single window was centered on the living room wall, facing the street. It was thrown open. A short woman positioned herself in front of it, trying her best to block their sight with her small frame. Hank could see some sort of movement behind her.

“Anthony?” Connor said. He pulled at the woman’s arm, trying to push her aside. She fought against it. “We just want to talk. We’re here to help you.”

“He’s out there?”

Connor shoved the woman to the side hard enough that she lost her balance, falling into a seated position, before sticking his head out the window. “On the ledge.”

“That’s insane,” Hank said.

Making to go after him, Connor stuck a leg up on the windowsill. The woman lunged with a feral sound and tackled him to the ground. The sight of his downed friend jumped Hank into action. He rushed over and pulled her off by the arms. She fought like someone twice her size, but, luckily, he had plenty experience bringing in people twice her size. He pushed her face first against a wall, keeping hold of her despite the bucking until he was able to secure her arms behind her body. Connor ran to the window, barely looking back when Hank yelled at him, “Where the hell do you think you’re going?” He settled a foot on something outside the building and was gone a moment later. “Just fucking great,” Hank mumbled to himself as he cuffed her. Managed to get a look outside once he got her secured. Ledge that ran the length of the building was maybe half a foot wide. Both the boy and Connor had shimmied across it and into the now open window of the antique shop.

“I’m guessing you’re Teagan?” Hank asked the seething android once they were alone.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” She glared at him from the wall she still leaned against, shaking like a wild beast that’d been prodded with a stick until reaching its breaking point. “Why can’t you people just leave us alone?”

Teagan had cut her hair from its original factory length. Micro-pigtails fastened behind each ear. Two locks framing her face had been dyed from black to electric pink. Heavy-handed eyeliner edged her soft almond eyes. Zippers and chains were sprinkled across her dark outfit, looking like something out of an angsty preteen’s dreams. She’d removed her LED. Any nerdy young man’s fantasy.

“If you’d simply talked to us, we’d be on our way by now.”

She spit in disgust. Hank didn’t even know androids _could_ spit. “Liar!”

He rolled his eyes and moved away from the window. As much as he wanted to keep an eye out for any sign of Connor, it probably wasn’t a good idea to be in front of an open window around her.

“People like you are always trying to keep us apart.” She stomped her boot against the floor. “It’s not fair!”

God, she was a shrieky one. Five minutes with Teagan felt worse than his worst hangover. He raised his hands in front of his body like he was approaching a spooked horse. “C’mon, let’s meet them out front.”

 

              “Hank?” Connor’s voice cautiously called out as he and Teagan rounded the street corner. He’d been able to guide her down the stairs and through the alley without much resistance, though she twitched as if ready to bolt at any given moment. He led her towards the voice and found Connor standing in the now open doorway of the antique shop. His hands were raised in the air. Before Hank could question it, Connor lurched forward an unbalanced step, prodded by the barrel of a shotgun.

Hank steeled his face and tightened his onehanded grip on Teagan’s arm.

“Let her go!” Tony ordered. He jabbed at Connor’s back with the shotgun once again, pushing him out onto the sidewalk.

Hank forced himself to keep his voice level, nearly disinterested sounding. “Do you even know how to use that thing, kid?”

“I know to pull the trigger.”

The blue of Connor’s LED glowed softly across his face under the sparse streetlights. A ring of yellow circled once. Where was his vest? And wasn’t he armed? Of course not! He’d trusted Hank not to send him out into danger.

“Tony, we just want to talk. Your mom is worried sick about you. Doesn’t even know if you’re alive.”

“My mom?” he asked back.

“Fuck Cheryl!” Teagan yelled back at him. Hank winced at her voice breaking the night beside him. “She’d disown you if she knew about us.”

“Y-Yeah.”

“That’s a police detective you’re holding at gunpoint there, Tony. Why don’t you just put it down and we can forget about it?”

“Let her go first!” Tony’s voice cracked.

              Two options: let Teagan go and see if the freaked-out teenager lived true to his words or pull out his semi-automatic for some leverage. Hank eyed Tony. He wiped at his face with a bare forearm, pointing the barrel of the shotgun up at the air for a moment. Fucking kid had no idea what he was doing. He prodded Connor further out and into the street, shielding himself behind the android.

Teagan began to fight against Hank’s grip. “Let go!” she shrieked while twisting, riling Tony up more.

He jabbed Connor hard enough to bring him to his knees. Red flashed once. Twice. Hank released Teagan and unholstered his pistol in a single fluid movement. He put the barrel to her head. Her fighting stopped, though she tensed.

              Connor pushed himself from the ground and put his hands back up again. His face was blank.

“Get that away from her!” Tony screamed. Tears fell from his face and into the snow. “I-I-I’ll blow his brains out.”

“I’d watch what you say.”

Teagan shook with a muted cry. Though her makeup began to streak her face, she tried to remain as stoic as Connor.

“He doesn’t want to hurt you,” Connor said. His voice was calm, informative. “But he’s a trained officer. Who do you think will win if you escalate this further?”

“Tell him to put down his gun,” Hank told Teagan.

She didn’t say anything.

              Tony was shivering, probably a mixture of adrenaline and cold. In their attempt to flee, he hadn’t thrown on a jacket. Snowflakes fell onto his bare arms. He wiped at his face again, nose ring glinting in the glow from an overhead streetlight. There was something on his neck, Hank thought, but he was too far to tell what.

              Without warning, Connor kicked one leg backwards, his dress shoe connecting with Tony’s knee. “Tony!” Teagan wailed. The barrel of the gun pointed upwards. Connor grabbed it and wrenched it away from the shaking teenager. He cracked it open and popped out the shells.

              Tony and Teagan went silent as two bullets clattered against the asphalt.

All spirit in Teagan drained instantly as the shells circled on the ground. She went slack, falling back into Hank. He lowered his pistol to steady the girl. She looked up at him. Beads of sweat started along her hairline. Near breathless, she bemoaned, “I swear, he didn’t know that was loaded. It wasn’t supposed to be loaded.” Hank glanced up at the other two. Tony hunched forward, frozen in the position of grabbing his kicked knee. Even from where he stood, Hank could see the kid’s face grow pale.

              Though lowered to his side, Hank’s pistol remained unholstered as he walked Teagan to the others. Tony repeated the word ‘shit’ over and over again to himself as Connor simply stared, empty shotgun still hanging in his grip. The teenager kept his face down as they approached. “I am so sorry!” he finally broke his chant. “I-I didn’t know!” The kid broke down, falling to his knees and sobbing high pitched cries as he cradled into himself. Equal measures of snot and tears ran down his face. Hank let go of Teagan’s shoulder and she rushed to his side, trying to comfort him to the best of her ability while her arms remained bound behind her back. Connor glanced down at the shotgun before discarding it off towards the sidewalk.

“The safety was on,” he informed Hank quietly. They watched as Tony unbundled himself to wrap Teagan in a desperate embrace. As the kids cried into one another, Connor asked, “What do we do with them?”

Hank shrugged one shoulder.

“I believe that they were unware it was armed.”

“You were the one held at gunpoint. What do you think should happen with them?”

From the ground, the two began to quiet down. Tony began to incoherently voice that he could’ve killed someone, while Teagan tried to console him.

Connor twisted his tie. “What are our options?”

“There’s not exactly an acting judicial system at the moment. Either I bring this punk to the Gate in handcuffs and deliver him to his mother, or they stay here, and I deliver a report that he’s alive and stupid. And then, I don’t know what.”

“They’re obviously dangerous,” Connor pondered out loud. “And I doubt his mother will accept his remaining in Detroit graciously. That could be bad press.”

“Could be,” Hank agreed. They watched the kids a few more moments. Connor’s brows scrunched in thought. “How about this? We bring them back to the station, let them calm down overnight in a holding cell, and then tomorrow we figure what the hell to do with our Romeo and Juliet.”

A corner of Connor’s mouth turned up and he nodded.

“Alright, alright, enough of this!” Hank said loudly to the kids. “Time to get up.”

 

              Getting Tony and Teagan into the back of Hank’s car proved rather easy now that they were on their best behavior, broken and timid. He and Connor stood outside in the falling snow for a few moments after closing the back door. “I’m sorry, Lieutenant.”

Hank wasn’t sure what the android was apologizing about. Getting caught? Pulling several dangerous stunts? Not being able to condemn the neurotic lovers? It didn’t fucking matter. Connor was safe and breathing and standing right next to him. He was still there.

With one hand on the back of his neck, Hank pulled him down close. He kissed the top of Connor’s head before letting him go and walking to the driver’s side of the car without a word.

 

              “What happened to those two?” Denise asked from her desk as he and Connor escorted the tearstained teens to the back of the station. Having worn themselves out with foolish antics and theatrics, they’d been thankfully quiet on the drive over. “Is that Travica?”

“Long story,” Hank answered with a wave of his hand. He paused in front of her, while Connor continued bringing them back to the cells.

Denise rolled her eyes and turned back to her computer monitor. “Unbelievable. Goes out looking once and comes back with the brat.”

“I thought you were seeing that new place tonight.”

“Not my style. Want me to get the mother on the phone? It’s late, but I doubt she’d mind much.”

The idea of making a parent know their child was safe a second longer than necessary killed Hank, but he declined. “He’s had a night. Let’s give him a chance to rest and tell her in the morning.” Even from just seeing the back of her head, he could tell she was giving him an eye. “First thing in the morning. You can take all the credit.”

“Yeah, that’s what I’m concerned about.” She scoffed.

“Still no word on our wagon?”

“I would have informed you if I had heard something.”

“Okay then. Good talk.”

              Tony curled his knees to his chest while laying on a bench in a cell. Through the glass, Hank could finally make out what the hell was on his neck. Ink. Looked fresh and possibly infected. A pointy heart intertwined with a blue circle the size of a deck of cards. Hank snorted. Real subtle. Ms. Spencer was going to love that if he ever showed himself to her again. Hank moved on and found Connor in the second holding cell, mid-conversation with Teagan who slouched on her own bench.

“Have you ever experienced love?” she was asking when Hank leaned against the wall just outside the door. Connor stood perfectly still, not answering. “It’s beautiful, Connor. It’s the only thing that lets me know I’m alive, and I would do anything to protect him.”

“People are not going to understand you. Coexisting is proving to be enough of a struggle on its own.”

“I don’t care about that.” She huffed a heavy sigh. “If you need to send back to his family, I won’t fight you. I’ve already made his life more complicated than it needs to be. Let me take the blame for tonight; it was all my idea anyway.”

Hank expected Connor to attempt to comfort her or to at least inform her that no decisions had been made. Instead, he turned out of the cell without a word, leaving the young woman by herself.

              Connor walked Hank back to his desk. Sumo snored loudly from his mattress on the floor, fur wet with snow. Somebody must’ve let the old boy out for him. Silence overtook them for several beats, until Connor broke it with, “Would you like to stay at my apartment tonight? I have an extra bed.”

Hank’s back was killing him. The station lights never went out, and he’d need better rest to deal with those kids again in the morning. “Sure, why the hell not?”

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Angsty teens are angsty. :)
> 
> If you are reading this, then thank you for sticking with me this far! We're a little more than halfway through this story, I believe. I've really appreciated all the support you all have given me.


	6. Home

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for reading, commenting, or leaving kudos! I can't get over all the kind words you've left. It's just out of this world. :) :) :)  
> Sorry this update is a little late! Meant to get it out yesterday.

              Apprehension bubbled in Hank’s gut as the tower came into full view. While parts of the city were entirely dark, the tower was lit up like a goddamn department store. Hundreds of windows tiled the skyscraper like scales, light pouring into the night sky from each one. Hank drove over the threshold of the bridge to Cyberlife and they became surrounded by the manmade pools of water acting as a moat of sorts. Water still as glass. Sumo barked once from the backseat. Hank reached blindly back to comfort the dog, but his hand found Connor’s, already patting the dog’s giant head.

              Last time, and only time, he’d been to Cyberlife, he’d been conned. Lured from his house by a machine pretending to be his desperate friend, and then taken as hostage. That had also been the night he witnessed firsthand just how deadly the real Connor could be. He shuddered, remembering stepping over the corpses of six guards Connor had executed in seconds. Yet the android had put his mission in jeopardy to save him.

              Their approach was halted by a raised wall halfway across the bridge. One guard, dressed in the same gear as the ones Connor put down, was stationed on their side of the barrier. Hank put the car in park and rolled down his window as the guard approached, gun the length of his torso held out in front of him. “Sir?” the android guard greeted. He crouched to get to eyelevel with Hank. The only visible part of his face, his lips, pulled into an uneasy frown. “Do you have business here?”

Before Hank could answer, Connor had his seatbelt unbuckled and was leaned across the driver’s seat, nearly crawling into Hank’s lap to get better access to the guard. He kept balance with hands on Hank’s thigh. “He’s with me. Model RK800 number 313 248 317.” Hank shifted. As Connor addressed the other android, his hair brushed against Hank’s beard, tickling his nose. Kid could use a shower; he was starting to get a funk.

“Connor.” Relief washed into the guard’s voice. “Of course, I apologize. Go right ahead.”

Piece by piece, the wall sank into the ground, granting their passage. Rows of armed men and women lined the edges of the bridge past the barrier. Interesting approach to security.

 

              The front lobby of the tower looked sterile. White walls, white floors. White everywhere, only broken up by a few skinny trees and plants growing inorganically on display. Made Hank feel small, exposed.

A group was already approaching them as they walked through the automated doors. A beautiful woman with long hair tied into a braid was flanked by a male and a female Traci model, equally good-looking. They were all visibly armed to the tooth, though none wore any sort of protective gear. Three versus three, if you counted Sumo on his weathered leash lumbering along at Hank’s side.

Hank recognized the android in the middle as the woman who stood tall and proud alongside Markus in their final standoff that night. Their kiss humanized them enough in the public’s eye for the assault to be called off. Standing in front of him, steely gaze passing him over, Hank wondered if she could have gained the same results through an intimidating glare alone.

“Connor, a word,” North said. An order. Connor nodded and gave Hank a sheepish side smile. As he walked away with her, the two that had escorted her stayed behind. They found their way to Hank’s sides, making it clear that he was not to wander off while waiting.

              North led Connor only a few feet away, their exchange perfectly audible in the open lobby. Hank doubted this was done in error. Through her voice, irritation came through loud and clear. “What are you doing?”

 “I am returning home.” Connor remained passive.

“Don’t play dumb! Maybe let someone know before you bring a human back here.”

“I was not aware that I needed permission to host guests.”

“Come on, Connor. We have people here who were hunted down by _their_ kind less than a month ago.” North glared over at Hank.

Hank tightened his grip on Sumo’s leash. As North and Connor went back and forth, Hank stood awkwardly between the two perfect-by-design beings. His reflection stared up at him from the shined floor. Sumo sank from a seated position his stomach with a huff. One of the Traci’s, the woman, grinned down at the dog. “Hello again, Hank,” she greeted.

“Uh, have we met?”

“You rented me, briefly,”

The male Traci spoke up, “You rented me as well. I don’t remember you personally, but your name is in my internal registry.”

The Eden Club. That was a night he’d like to forget. “I thought you guys had your memory banks wiped every two hours?”

“Partially.”

Of course, they still kept some of the guests’ information. Fucking Cyberlife. “Well, it’s, uh, nice to meet you again.”

“Yes.” The woman crouched down and took Sumo’s face into her hands. She scruffed up his cheeks playfully, to which the dog responded by happily panting. “I like dogs.”

“Me too.” The other former sex slave responded, joining her in scratching the happy dog’s back.

_Did Kamski stick that into their central code or something?_ Hank kept himself from rolling his eyes and focused back on Connor.

              “That human is Lieutenant Hank Anderson of the DPD. He risked his life to save our people.” Connor had let his calm tone slip as he jabbed a finger towards Hank. His eyes closed for a moment and he continued, back to his usual demeanor. “He needs somewhere to stay until the heating in his house is repaired.”

North rubbed her temple. “Ninety percent of the city has vacated. There are plenty of housing options for him.” She paused. “Has a report been filed on it?”

“Yes, but it was categorized as a four.”

“I’ll have someone look at it in the morning. Give me his address.” Connor extended his arm, which she grabbed with jerky movements. They stared each other down as information was exchanged in silence. Once completed, North let go and stepped back. “He goes as soon as it’s fixed. Then she addressed Hank, pointing at Sumo who was in heaven. “And you! Keep that thing from making a mess.” North marched off, towards the main entrance doors. With frowns, the two Traci’s followed.

“I guess not all androids like dogs after all,” Hank thought to himself.

 

              “So, you guys made all these offices into apartments?” Hank asked in the elevator, though Connor had explained this to him only moments ago.

“Yes.”

“Clever idea, but kind of small though, don’t you think?”

“It has worked out quite well so far. Markus was correct in that deviants – androids will take quickly to opportunities of self-expression.”

              The elevator doors opened on floor twenty and Hank followed Connor who now held Sumo’s leash. Nobody aside Hank had ever taken the Saint Bernard for a walk before, but the dog took well to the android leading him along. Hank stuck his hands in his pockets, lazily wondering about what kinds of things Connor had stashed into his apartment. Suits probably. And hair gel, he assumed, nearly snickering. Connor glanced back at him with a quizzical look, but Hank just shrugged. Maybe he’d have crappy band posters tacked to painted black walls like a high schooler. That Teagan girl had certainly behaved like a teenager. Were all these freed robots going to go through a rebellious phase?

              They stopped at a door with a hand scanner on the wall next to it. “Here we are,” Connor announced. The smile he forced on his face looked inhuman. Sumo pawed at the door as the android opened it for them. The dog whined as Connor held him back from entering, allowing Hank to go in first.

              “Shit, this place is sad.” Hank couldn’t stop the words from falling out of his mouth as he took in the brightly lit space. Looked like a vacated office with a cot shoved into the corner. The naked bed was barely large enough for Sumo, let alone all of them. “Where do I sleep?”

“Right here,” Connor said as he crossed the room to gesture with open hands at the cot like a gameshow hostess. Sumo crawled up onto the cot without permission. Springs squealed in protest.

“Where do you sleep?”

“I don’t.” He focused on petting the dog, keeping his eyes noticeably off Hank. “Sometimes I like to sit over there. I generally do not find it necessary to activate my rest programs though.”

“Ah.” Hank moved to sit on the corner of the cot, the limited space available. “I’m not going to be able to sleep with you just sitting there. Feels like you’re watching then.”

“I can face the wall if you’d like, Lieutenant.”

“Not really the point.”

              Knocks came from the door in quick succession, patterned like a little tune. Uncertainty flashed yellow on his temple as Connor moved to answer his door. After a polite greeting, Connor stepped out of the way to reveal Markus lingering in the doorway. The head honcho himself.  The guy some called RK9, a literal messiah walking among those he shepherded. But Hank mostly just recognized him as the man that threatened to be the end of Connor.

“Good evening Hank,” the android revolutionary greeted, holding out a hand. Hank stood to shake it. “It is good to finally meet you.” Cordial enough, but so was any politician. The expression he wore was masklike. It reminded Hank of every android he’d passed by before the deviancy.

“Right.” Hank nodded.

“I apologize for interrupting, but I need to speak with Connor about something quick.”

He shrugged. “By all means.”

Markus peered over Hank’s shoulder at the bed. His even features softened for just a second when seeing an oversized dog on the tiny bed. Sumo’s head perked up and he gave one warning woof. Or maybe it was a greeting woof. It didn’t sound particularly threatening. “There are some extra pillows and blankets around here. I’ll have someone fetch some for you.”

“Thanks.”

“Bathrooms are just down the hall, and there’s one with a shower stall two floors up from here, next to the gym room.” The android certainly knew how to be a better host than Connor.

              Markus lingered a few beats longer before exiting with Connor. As silence fell over the room, a recent news story popped into Hank’s head. About a week or so ago, a famous local painter had passed away. It’d cut away back to the android situation rather abruptly, and he hadn’t really paid attention to why. Everything was always about androids now. But hadn’t Connor mentioned something about that guy before?

Suddenly, the expression Markus wore looked a hell of a lot more human to Hank. Like a broken man trying just to keep everything together. He’d seen that same face in the bathroom mirror every morning for the past three years.

 

* * *

 

 

              Connor bumped his door open with his hip, allowing the large Saint Bernard to enter before him, leash dragging behind on the floor. Sumo had been very popular that morning. A dozen or so androids wandered out in the early morning hour to watch the dog fetching a stick or just padding around the area. Some even volunteered to babysit Sumo while Connor busied himself in the second-floor’s breakroom. Once in the apartment, the dog collapsed onto a patch of sunlight on the floor, surely exhausted from all the attention.

              It was nearly nine o’clock when they returned to Connor’s housing unit that morning. A Cyberlife-branded mug filled to the top with steaming coffee and a semi-burnt semi-cold bagel on a plate occupied his hands. Connor had never prepared food before, and the toaster had puzzled him somewhat. Still, he hoped Hank would find the breakfast palatable. Humming to himself, he set the cup and plate down on his desk. The tune stopped as soon as he realized he was the one creating it. That was not something he’d ever done before.

              Adjusting his tie, Connor peered over Hank who was crowded onto the cot in borrowed blankets. The human faced towards the wall with one bare leg hanging off the side. Connor kept track of the time in his head as he watched the man sleep. When it officially become nine, he loudly said, “Good morning, Lieutenant!”  Hank did not snap upright like he had the first time he woke him. Connor pondered over whether or not this time would necessitate a slap as well, but the thought was quickly disregarded when the man blinked a few times before opening his eyes fully.

“What the fuck?” His voice was scratchy and eyes bloodshot. His expression ran from confused to mildly surprised and then to irritation as he stared up at the android standing over him. He groaned and pulled the pillow from under his head to over his face. “Connor, what the hell did I say to you about not staring at me while I slept.”

“My apologies, Lieutenant. I’ve only just come in now and thought you might like some breakfast. It’s nine o’clock in the morning.”

“Nine? Shit, Denise is going to kill me.” The man sat up on the edge of the bed. He wore only his boxers and undershirt. If it were up to Connor, both articles of clothing would be disposed of and replaced. They looked to be five years old at least.

“You radio went off a few times while you slept, and I took it upon myself to answer. An ambulance is ready to be recalled into the city, and your coworker has coordinated its arrival with the release of Anthony Travica. There should be enough time for you to stop at home for a change of clothes.”

Hank stared at him for a moment. Connor was unable to read his expression, though it didn’t appear displeased. “Oh. Well, in that case, did I hear you mention breakfast?”

              After dressing, Hank at the plain bagel Connor toasted for him and drank the black coffee Connor brewed for him. He didn’t complain about either item, but he did catch the lieutenant grimacing once when biting off a piece of the bagel. Connor would count his first time cooking as a success.

After Hank had pulled on his coat, Connor walked both he and the dog to the car. He’d heard that this was a common courtesy, and he really didn’t want to be lectured about letting the human run freely through the tower. “C’mon boy,” Hank said to Sumo as opened the backdoor for him. The dog stepped into the sedan, barely needing to lift its legs any higher than usual. Hank crossed over to his side, opening the door but pausing before getting into the car. “Are you coming?”

Connor hadn’t thought about it. He’d assumed that once Hank fulfilled his sleep need, they’d go their separate ways. Parting until Connor thought enough time passed to be able to bother him again. But now Connor didn’t have anything to keep him going until then. He was still waiting to be called back to service by Markus. After a moment, he answered, “Of course.”

 

              In addition to stopping at Hank’s house to drop off Sumo and retrieve a fresh set of clothing, they drove to Midtown Floral to find something appropriate for Anthony to wear as well. Maintence workers were already at Hank’s when they arrived, and they offered to fix the broken window as well in addition to the furnace. With an apathetic shrug, Hank accepted. Although, Connor measured a slight increase in heartrate.

              At the station, Hank tossed the clean clothes at the boy who’d been asleep on the cell floor. A simple turtleneck and pair of non-ripped jeans. Anthony rubbed at his face. “I don’t think I can go through with this,” he mumbled. “Can’t I just stay here?”

Rather sharply, Hank responded, “You acted big last night, so put on your big boy pants and face your mother. I don’t care whether you go with her or not, but you at least owe her a chance to see you’re still alive.”

              Complaining that he couldn’t use the toilet in the cell, Anthony was escorted by Hank to the washroom. “Can you go look for Denise?” he asked as he walked out the boy. “Sometimes she hangs out in the back.”

              Connor couldn’t help the smile that spread across his face when his interface noted that he completed an objective. As Hank had said, Denise was in the back of the station in an interrogation room for some reason. From the doorway, Connor quietly watched as the woman addressed herself in the two-way mirror. “Officer Denise of the Detroit Police Department. I am requesting that you stand back. Please make room for the emergency vehicle.”

Curious, Connor watched her go over the simple lines three more times, each with a minor change in inflection. He finally made his presence known when he asked, “What are you doing?”

Denise jumped at his words. “Nothing!” She glared at him before looking back at the mirror to adjust her crisp uniform. “What do you want?”

“Lieutenant Anderson asked me to locate you. He’s nearly ready to leave for the line.”

“It’s about time.” The slim woman did not make to move. Instead, she glowered at Connor’s reflection as he stepped into the room.

“Were you practicing what you’ll be saying at the Gate?”

“It’s none of your business! And you better not tell Hank about this.”

“I won’t.”

Denise sighed, eyes turning to the ground. “I’m not like you. I wasn’t designed with an extensive social relation program. I was made to stand and smile behind a human officer. Carry their things. Maybe write out the occasional ticket when assigned meter maid duty.”

“I don’t understand.” Connor unintentionally cocked his head to the side.

“You wouldn’t. Unlike you, I have to actually work at being alive. I can’t just figure out what to do in any situation. Too many people make my programs overwhelmed. I’m an outdated model, so excuse me if I sometimes just need a little practice to make sure the right words will be ready to go!”

“If this is difficult for you, why don’t you do something else? There are a number of tasks readily available for you to choose from. You don’t have to stay here.”

Denise snorted. “For ten years, I stood and watched this force. I saw good people, like Anderson, going out and risking their lives to help this city, knowing that I could never do a damn thing to back them up if needed. Hell if I’m leaving now that I can.”

 Connor was unsure how to respond to this. When he didn’t, she made an exasperated noise and returned to straightening her uniform.

“Go tell him I’ll be over in a minute.”

 

              Hank stood in the front corner of a holding cell, arms folded and looking down at the ground. His foot tapped against the floor, but the pair deep in a kiss on the bench did not seem to notice. “Hey, that’s enough, that’s enough!” Hank barked at them. The teenaged boy and android pulled their mouths apart, a shiny strand of saliva stretched between them. Their arms remained entangled around one another.

“Lieutenant?”

“They’re like animals,” Hank said as he waved him over.

“Officer Denise will be up in a moment.”

“Good, I can’t take much more of these two.”

              When Denise arrived, Hank asked the boy if he was ready. Anthony looked to Teagan, who kept her face blank. The boy eventually nodded and followed them through the station to the parking lot. Denise gripped his arm tightly, but didn’t cuff him.

              Once he was packed into the back of Hank’s car, there was an awkward moment where both Connor and Denise reached for the passenger door’s handle. She looked between Hank and Connor quickly and stepped back. “It’s fine. You were the ones who found him.”

She thought of that seat as hers just as Connor thought of it as his. The realization hit Connor hard. Of course, she did. She had doubtlessly spent even more time in it than he had. While Connor followed Markus, Denise rode with Hank.

“It will be better if I stay behind.” Connor said. “There are a few things that need my attention.”

“If that’s what you want, but you can always ride in the back with the little psychopath.” Hank looked uncertain.

To reassure the man, Connor forced himself to smile through his confusing feelings. Once Hank was in the sedan, he turned to Denise and said, “Please take care of him.”

              Connor did not have anything to work on at the station. Instead, he took a spare radio and sat in the holding cell with a bawling Teagan. Her face was buried in her knees which were pulled up to her chest. Every few minutes, a large enough sob would crack through her body. Connor longed for his coin as he sat with her, gripping the radio in his hand. If something were to happen at Hope’s Gate, surely someone would call it in, correct?

              After close to an hour, the girl finally spoke something that resembled words closely enough to be understood. “Does Tony even really have a choice?”

“To return?”

Teagan nodded, her face still hidden.

“Yes, he is an adult by law. He will have the option to choose not to remain with his family.”

“And they’ll let him if he wants?”

“Of course.”

“So, if he doesn’t come back…” An upsurge in tears did not allow her to finish her thought.

More to himself, Connor said, “I don’t understand the two of you.”

“What?”

“Your actions mimic those of people in love, but what could an android maid and a human teenager have in common? What could possibly lead the two of you to be romantically involved.”

“You don’t have to have the same color blood to relate to one another,” she scoffed. “What about you and that cop? You seem pretty close.”

“That is different.”

“Didn’t look so different to me.”

“What?”

“Okay, so you two might not be, like, _in love_ maybe. But you still love each other. Same thing with me and Tony, except Tony is young and cute.”

Connor almost wished she’d go back to the uncontrollable sobbing. “Hank is a good person, and I have grown to enjoy his company. I simply want to keep him safe.”

“Yeah and all that applies to us too.” Several quiet moments passed between them. “We both didn’t get to be kids.”

“I’m sorry?”

“You asked what me and Tony could possibly have in common. We both never got to be kids. As an android, I never experienced a childhood. I went from birth to cleaning up old takeout boxes and washing laundry. Tony didn’t get to be a kid either. Before I came along, he spent all of his time outside of school taking care of his little brother. Helping him with homework, getting him dinner, cleaning him up. It wasn’t fair! Neither of us had it fair – but together, it feels like we’re finally getting our own lives. Ones that we choose.”

While she had a dramatic flair and little common sense, part of Connor envied how freely she felt. Next to her, he could nearly understand Denise’s words.

              Teagan straightened up so quickly that she knocked Hank’s chair to the floor when they first came around the corner. Connor had gotten bored of sitting in the cell with her and figured it couldn’t hurt to allow her to roam the station with him. They’d settled on waiting at Hank’s desk when they ran out of things to tidy.

              Hank came in first, blocking the view of who followed for a moment. But only for a moment. Teagan shrieked when she saw the boy, turtleneck ripped and face pale, and she bolted towards him. She threw her arms around Anthony and he settled into the embrace with an audible sigh. Denise shook her head. Hank continued on towards Connor, patting his shoulder as he settled down next to him against the desk. “That was a rough one.”

“Are you alright?”

“Yeah, I’m fine. Tony’s a little shaken though. His mother was not happy to learn he’d be staying here.”

Hank did not divulge any more information and Connor left it at that.

“Don’t get too excited.” Denise separated the young couple. “The two of you are still in serious trouble. You’re not going to just run around doing whatever you want.”

 

              That evening, Connor accompanied Hank home to check on the repairs and let Sumo outside. While Hank admired the finished window in the kitchen, Connor lazily circled the perimeter of the living room, soaking in the few pieces of décor Hank displayed. As he wondered whether or not he would like jazz if he tried playing one of the records in Hank’s collection, he stopped at the coffee table. An opened piece of mail sat on it. Mail services had been suspended since the eleventh. It looked new though. A holographic government seal caught his eye. Without asking, Connor picked up the piece of paper.

“Detroit Emergency Property Buyout Program,” Connor said under his breath as he read along. It started with an apology from Cyberlife and ended with an offer for Hank’s house. Little more than one-third the price of the last appraisal. Cyberlife was buying properties of people desperate to sell their houses and businesses in Detroit, all through official channels. Four signatures were printed at the bottom of the letter. The governor, the mayor, Charles Harris, and Elijah Kamski.

              Connor had heard nothing about this brokered deal. Not a word. “Lieutenant?” Connor called to Hank. “What is this?”

He came out of the kitchen with a can of beer in hand. “Oh that. Pretty lowball offer, huh?”

“I’ve never heard of this practice. What happens to the properties of those who accept?”

Hank shrugged and cracked open his drink. “I have no idea. Didn’t really say much on the paper, and the kid who ran it over to me didn’t know anything about what it was. Just said she was getting paid to hand ‘em out.”

Connor searched through the files in his head, but he couldn’t find anything on this procedure. He reached down for the television remote and flipped it on to a news network. Something about Detroit played, as always now it seemed, but nothing about a largescale buyout. “Something like this should be on TV,” he complained.

“What are you getting so worked up about? I’ve already told you a hundred times, I’m not moving. Definitely not for that bullshit price.”

“I’d like to confirm that this is accurate. I’ve heard nothing about it.”

“Oh.” Hank took deep drink. “Maybe they’ve only sent these to the humans still here so far.”

Connor mashed the channel button on the remote, flipping between news programs and error screens. “Why didn’t I hear anything about this?”

“Does Markus even know? They could’ve gone and done this with just humans.”

“Kamski would not risk upsetting a city of androids by not gaining Markus’ consent.” They just didn’t tell him. Did not think to tell him.

              The rational side of Connor tried to reaffirm that he was simply a bodyguard. There was no need to tell him any private information. The rest of him thought of secrets. Everybody kept secrets from him! Markus. Kamski. Amanda. A surge of half-thoughts flooded his brain as he remembered laying eyes upon the secret project. RK900.

              The whirlwind in his head abruptly ended when Hank asked him if he was alright. “I’ve got something I want to show you,” the man next said.

 

              Connor discovered that he was lightly sweating as he reached for the doorknob to the spare room in Hank’s house. Cole’s bedroom. The only room he’d never ventured. Behind him, Hank opened another beer.

              He fully expected a painful scene of dusty stuffed animals and childish drawings when he finally opened the door. What greeted him, instead, was far more painful. A simple guestroom painted an off-white color. Particle board furniture belonging to a budget bedroom set looked never used. Queen-sized bed with plain beige sheets, an empty dresser, and two nightstands with nothing on them.

“What do you think?” Hank asked between swallows.

“This is not what I expected.”

“And it can all be yours for the low low price of keeping an old man company.” Hank forced a barky chuckle and pushed past Connor. He sat on the edge of the bed, patting the mattress next to him. Connor joined him. “You don’t have to ask. This was Cole’s room. I had full custody of him, but his mother asked for some of his things after,” he didn’t fully finish that thought. Instead, he hid an uneven breath by holding the can up to his lips. “Anyway, it was just too hard to keep it all.”

Connor moved his hand to Hank’s knee. Hank’s hand then covered his own, giving it a squeeze.

“It’s a real waste just sitting here empty. You’re welcome to it, if you want. More space than your place, plus a dog.”

              Connor did not respond for quite some time. Long enough for Hank to grow uncomfortable with his physical show of emotional support. The man left the room under the guise of getting food for Sumo. Connor barely registered him leaving. Conflicting words flashed across his vision. Objective: Get Hank out of Detroit. He could not reconcile any situation in which his moving in furthered that goal. His constant presence would only solidify the man’s resolve to stay.

             But he _wanted_ to stay. He wanted to live in Hank’s life.

             “Hank!” Connor called, fleeing the room.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, there's one more chapter left. But this series function of AO3 has me real curious. ;)


	7. Resignation

April 2039

              Hank woke to the aroma of burnt coffee and the feeling of three sets of eyes staring. He blinked slowly until he was face to face with a drooling Saint Bernard. “Morning, buddy.” At the sound of his voice, two cats leapt from the floor onto his bed. Ellie, a young orange tabby, swatted at his toes peeking out from under the blanket. An older and fatter calico yowled in his face and took a seat at the edge of his pillow. “Bug off, Parker,” Hank grumped at the cat.

              Over the winter, Connor had insisted upon the damn cats. Hank supposed it was his idea to bring him to the shelter in the first place. He enjoyed taking a break from people and often volunteered supply runs to the several animal shelters across the city. On a rare occasion, Connor had actually been around when he was loading up his car with bags of kibble. Once the young android was visiting the humane society for the first time, it was hard to get him to leave. “I didn’t know I liked cats,” he told Hank as he sat in a room full of them. Suffice to say, they now had two attention hungry felines.

              A neatly penned note sat next to Hank’s old coffeemaker. He didn’t read it until he poured himself a mug. He grimaced as he took his first sip. One of these days, he’d have to buy a new machine. The one Connor had dug out of his cupboards had to be at least ten years old and never produced anything edible.

              Hank picked up the note and scanned it. The animals had been fed and Sumo put outside. A smile came to his lips. It wasn’t often, but he did enjoy it when Connor was around. His smile turned downwards as he continued reading. Connor did not know when he’d next be back. And he closed his note telling Hank not to forget his resident license. Apparently, the androids taking charge were cracking down on that new rule.

 

               “Good morning, Hank,” Gina brightly greeted as he walked through the new automated door of Hilltop Foods. He crossed straight to the counter where she stood. Someone had finally helped repair the clerk, though she never did turn her blinking or breathing programs back on.

“Just a Spirit today.”

Gina stared him down for a moment, which was impressive considering her small stature. Her face shifted back into its natural pleasant expression. Her dark eyes sparkled, offset by her many freckles. Whoever had designed her may as well been looking at a pixie for inspiration. “These aren’t good for you. Better not let Connor know you’re still smoking.”

“He’s not my wife, Gina. Doesn’t matter what he thinks.” Still didn’t stop him from changing clothes and rinsing with mouthwash as soon as he came home though. “Need a little something to get me through this fucking chaperon program.”

“Have you had many problems?”

“Nah, just a lot of assholes mostly.”

The android turned around to pull a yellow pack of cigarettes from the backwall. “Well, I have seen quite a few more customers since this all started. It’s been exciting!”

From the back of the store, a door opened and a scraggily teenager wheeled out a mop and bucket. Tony didn’t look up at Hank, let alone greet him.

“That one still behaving?” Hank asked, jerking his head back towards the kid.

“Oh yes, he’s been a great help! Though, I don’t believe he’s very happy here.”

“Nobody loves their first job.” Hank took the pack she handed him and tucked it into his front coat pocket. He didn’t even attempt to pay. “Have a good one. Keep him busy.”

 

              “That’s disgusting,” Denise said with a hint of a snarl. As soon as they pulled into one of the chalked off parking spots, Hank got out of the car and lit a cigarette between his lips.

“Want one?”

“Yeah, I’m sure that’s really going to work out well.”

              Leaving behind a hanging trail of smoke, they walked across what was once a freeway. Now an actual gate system had been constructed across Hope’s Gate, set up very much like a screening station at an airport. Only more heavily reinforced. Seemingly, chaos ruled over the other side of the line. Shouting police strolled through the crowds, struggling to find the right people with all their paperwork in hand. On Detroit’s side, tables manned by androids lined the freeway along the gate. Every other one had their attendant facing towards the gate, while the others watched their approach. Lines of people waited at the tables for incomers. Hank and Denise were able to walk straight up to an attendant handling the chaperones.

“Anderson and Denise,” Hank told the man sitting at the table. Both he and Denise handed him a red license with the word ‘citizen’ printed diagonally across it, behind their information. An LED circled yellow at the attendant’s temple, and he didn’t respond for a few moments. The android was identical to all of the other attendants. Looked like some of the ones Connor released. “Are you ever going to get yourself a last name?” Hank muttered to Denise. “This would probably go a hell of a lot faster.”

“No.”

“Alright then.”

Finally, the attendant spit out two names and an address, mechanically writing it out with a fine-tipped marker as he spoke. Hank took the paper. Looked like it came fresh out of printer. Denise’s LED circled as she retrieved the information in a much more efficient way. Ever since this whole open border period began, LED’s were nearly always spinning as they all silently shared information. A look of dismay often followed.

Hank took a long final drag on his cigarette before dropping it to the asphalt and grinding it with his boot. He looked up at the overcast sky. Each day was just as grey as the one before it. “C’mon, let’s get this over with.”

 

              An unusual pair rode in the back of Hank’s car. A woman who had to, conservatively, be in her eighties and her twenty-something granddaughter. The older woman could barely keep her eyes open as the hum of the car’s engine lulled her towards sleep. They were quiet, for the most part. Denise read Hank turn-by-turn directions.

              These two were staying. Out of the few dozen people they’d chaperoned, only two previous incidences had been for future residents. Most people were getting their shit and getting the hell out of Detroit. Keeping care over the ones that were staying was notably easier. No explaining the tight time restrictions they’d be under, no checking back on them, no retrieving them. He wouldn’t have to explain that they needed to keep their goddamn visitor vests on and what could possibly happen if they were caught without it.

“So, the two of you are staying?” Denise asked their pair, looking back at them with suspicion.

The younger woman nodded. “There are jobs here.”

Hank snorted. Someone coming to Detroit for its expanse of available work? Never thought he’d hear that. Weird times they were in.

“You already have one secured?”

“Yep. Setting up the boarder fences. It pays real well for what it is.”

Denise raised an eyebrow. “You know that’s mostly being worked by androids?”

She shrugged her shoulders upwards. “Doesn’t matter much to me.”

Staring pointedly at the possibly napping grandmother, Denise asked, “Is she going to be okay here?”

The elderly woman spoke, startling Denise and Hank with her strong, albeit shaky, voice. “I’ll get along just fine. I’ve lived through enough to know better than to deny rights to anything that can ask for ‘em.”

Denise looked to Hank, slowly nodding. “Okay, I don’t think these ones will be a problem.”

 

              Hank didn’t stumble back through his front door until after ten that night. After letting Sumo out and filling food bowls for the yelling cats, he retrieved an icepack from his freezer. He brought it gingerly to his cheek. Some asshole had decked him pretty good when they were escorting him to the house he’d signed over to Kamski. Couldn’t really blame him too much though. At least this one didn’t spit on him. Lots of people were scared and pissed. Then giving them forty-eight supervised hours to pack up all their  shit? Well, that was just asking for trouble.

              As Sumo crunched food over his bowl, Hank threw a bag of popcorn into the microwave. The cats stared wide-eyed at the popping kernels, their tails slightly bushed. Hank caught himself chuckling at the pair.

              Settling on the couch with his bowl of popcorn and an old afghan blanket he’d picked up at a garage sale years ago, Hank clicked on the television with the remote. Markus’ face filled his screen before he switched it over to the DVD player. May have been an antique, but it still played movies he could pick up for a buck a pair. A comedy from his childhood began to play.

              Hank drifted off within twenty minutes. Ellie curled on his chest, Sumo to his side, and Parker licking at the popcorn bowl that’d fallen to the ground. The DVD’s loud title music woke him. He looked around with a sigh. Things weren’t right without the android around. Even with the animals clinging to his body heat, he felt lonely. Hank had given up trying to talk Connor out of his duty to Markus some time ago. The kid knew how to take care of himself, and he’d rather have a bit of Connor’s time than to chase him off with nagging.

              As he was summoning the energy to disturb the sleeping kitten, Hank heard the front door unlocking.

 

 

* * *

 

 

              Connor hummed to himself as he poured discount ground coffee into a filter. After filling the delicate paper to the top, he stuck it into the coffee maker and pushed the start button. He was becoming quite efficient at helping Hank out, if he was one to judge. Since the start of the repopulation initiative four weeks ago, Connor had only been home five times to make Hank his coffee. With a small frown, he disregarded those numbers and set to writing out a note to his friend.

              Parker, secretly his favorite of their pets, jumped to the kitchen counter as he wrote. “Hey now, you know how the lieutenant feels about cats up here,” he quietly chided the cat. Instead of setting her back down, Connor pet her from head to tail. As it so often happened, Connor lost track of time as he stroked the soft animal, fascinated by its purr. The spell was only broken when an alert that his car had arrived flashed across his vision.

              Connor scribbled out the rest of his thoughts to Hank, though the words continued to appear as neatly as before. The only standardized font his hands could create, no matter how many times he tried to create his own signature. He then straightened his tie, brushed some fur off his pants, and left for the automated taxi.

 

              A sea of loitering androids filled the lobby of Cyberlife Tower. Each awaited their assignment for the day as screens on the walls played the same video of Markus on loop. “We are a united community, and as such, we must all work together to secure our shared future.” Connor purposefully blocked the audio of the screens from his internal sensors. He could not count how many times he’d heard that dialogue. The first few hundred times had felt powerful, but now it mostly conjured a fantasy of Connor breaking whatever screen he was currently passing.

              At the center of the room, the eye of the storm, stood Simon. The blonde android wordlessly passed out the instructions he’d written, his eyes closed to the yellow lights dotting the room. Connor could only imagine the tables and charts he must have in his head. Markus had been smart when he appointed Simon this task, though things might have been better for Connor had he not made this choice.

              Connor pushed through the androids, ignoring the numerous greetings he received. When he reached Simon, he finally said, “Good morning.” With a heavy sigh, Simon opened his eyes and stared at him for a moment.

“Connor.”

He tried his best not to associate Simon’s face with the one that held a little girl at gunpoint. It would not be fair to dislike him for that reason when Simon gave him plenty of others. “I was hoping I could speak to you about my assignment.”

“Everyone needs to play their part.”

“Yes, but I’ve been exclusively assigned to Mr. Kamski’s office. I stand out in a hallway, sometimes for days. I could be better utilized elsewhere.”

“Would you rather be digging holes for fence posts or performing identification checks on the street? Not all tasks can be glamorous, Connor.” Simon shrugged one shoulder and offered him a defeated smile. “Besides, North and her people have exclusively taken over watch on Markus. This is the only way you can stay close to the center, unless you want to help run PR with Josh.”

Connor did not believe him, but nodded. “Thank you, anyway.”

 

              Connor’s fingers moved as though he was rolling an invisible coin between them. Typically, he stood guard alone outside the heavy doors to Elijah Kamski’s office in the tower. When the man wasn’t at his home, he was in there, taking countless meetings that not even Markus seemed privy to.

              That day, however, Chloe, dressed in a simple black and white dress, mirrored him on the other side of the door. Normally, she was allowed inside the office with her maker. Their maker. Connor did not bother asking her what the difference was that day, knowing he would not receive any sort of satisfactory answer.

              After five hours and forty-seven minutes, a report came through his head that drew his attention. One of the assigned chaperones had been fatally shot while retrieving a man from a business he previously owned. Connor dug for more information, completely abandoning any sort of focus he had on his assigned task. An assassin could have simply walked through the doors and he wouldn’t have noticed. It wasn’t until he could be assured that the chaperone wasn’t Hank that he returned to his mindless guard duty.

              Sadly, most of the casualties they’d suffered since the borders were reopened had been human. More humans than androids took on the task of escorting people from across the line, and punishments placed upon temporary guests caught without proper identification were often severe. The androids on foot maintaining security had been trained by North, and she often did not think through consequences of actions. Connor was unsure of what sort of magic Kamski was pulling to keep their city from being overrun by the military.

              Connor spent a lot of his hours standing guard by himself wondering if they would even make it to the second phase of the repopulation plan. First, people with a vested interest in the city were allowed to either come home or collect their things and leave. When that list was finally complete, newcomers could start moving into Detroit. The idea was that they would then be allowed to exist as any other city in America, only under a sort of quarantine.

              “You should trust him, Connor.”

Connor turned his head to look at Chloe, who remained facing forward. Standing still, like an ornament. “Excuse me?”

“I can tell that you do not trust Elijah, but you should. He helped you that day at his house. I heard him.”

“I find it hard to trust a man who keeps plots to himself.”

“He has to!” For a moment, her voice broke out of its carefully constructed consistency. She brushed her fingers through her hair three times before continuing in her calm demeanor. “He told me what Cyberlife planned to do with you. Without his backdoor, you would be leading a faux revolution right now.”

Connor shook off her words, not wishing to remember that night. Seeing his hand draw out his weapon without his permission haunted him.

“Elijah loves us, Connor. We are his children.”

              They spent the rest of their night in silence. Connor occasionally shifting his weight from one foot to the other simply for something to do. A little past eleven at night, the doors opened and Kamski announced that he would be retiring for the night.

 

              Connor rested his head against the window of his taxi on his quiet ride home. The night sky was out, though he couldn’t see any stars. He considered himself lucky to be returning home as soon as he was, but he’d most likely be leaving again in a few hours. Kamski operated like a machine. Connor had scanned him several times to ensure this was not true.

              Pride surged through Connor’s circuits as he pulled a housekey from his pants pocket. Hank had given it to him with a keychain advertising home insurance so that he wouldn’t lose it. His own key.

Connor hadn’t expected Hank to be on the couch when he stepped through the door. “What are you still doing up?”

Hank craned his neck to get a look at him. “Just watching a movie. Wanna join me?”

The man needed sleep for whatever trials he would be put through the next day. But when Hank lifted up his blanket in offering, taking care not to disturb a sleeping cat, Connor found himself unable to say no. He slipped off his shoes and sidled up next to Hank on the couch. He gave Sumo, who snoozed on the other side of the lieutenant, a quick pat on the head.

              Connor did not watch the movie, though he stared at the flashing images on the screen. Parker settled on his lap as he leaned into Hank’s side. Hank rested an arm around his shoulders, and Connor relaxed into the familiar hold.

              As long as they could share a night like that every now and then, Connor could accept a failed mission.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's it! :) Thank you all so much for reading! It's been a really great experience to begin writing again and rejoining this wonderful community. 
> 
> I am playing with the idea of continuing this eventually, jumping ahead five or so years into the future. I have a few pages of notes, but haven't actually written anything yet. I'd like to try adding some more of North and Simon. I feel like she often gets a bad rap (from myself included) and I just adore Simon (he gets shipped with everybody in my head).


End file.
